The Complex Love Life of Soccer Legend Franz Beckenbauer: Scandal, Romance, and Heartbreak

Franz Beckenbauer and his second wife, Sybille, in the port of Marseille, in May 1990 (Bongarts/Getty Images)

Franz Beckenbauer died at the age of 78, leaving a great pain in the world of football, the sport in which he conquered so much as a versatile player in Bayern Munich and the German national team, as well as knowing how to taste the honeys of success as a coach by leading his team to the title in the 1990 World Cup, just as he did in 1974 as a footballer.

With his death on January 7, some stories from the Kaiser’s private life related to family and sentimental matters began to come to light. The soccer legend had his “dark side,” according to journalist Vanessa Peschla in the German magazine Bunte. The media in that country assure that his clandestine relationships outside the playing fields were a kind of open secret and that as a result they have left breakups and children out of wedlock, according to the newspaper Bild.

Beckenbauer’s first great love was Brigitte Wittmann, whom he married at the age of 21 in 1966. They met when she was working as a secretary at the German Football Federation (DFB) and they say that the soccer star brought him a bar every day. of chocolate and invited her to romantic walks along the Isar River, according to the German’s biography titled “The Emperor Man: A Bright Figure with a Dark Side,” written by Florian Kienast.

Brigitte, who had shown her love for Franz by adopting the son (Thomas) that the footballer had had at 18 with a co-worker at the Allianz company (Ingrid Grönke), ended up separating from her first husband to marry the footballer in a wedding that took place secretly late at night on the shores of Lake Wörth, surrounded by their inner circle and with the bride and groom arriving in separate cars. “Before marrying Wittmann, Beckenbauer had a son, Thomas, with her childhood sweetheart, Ingrid Grönke, who was born in 1963. Brigitte Beckenbauer later adopted Franz’s son, Thomas, from their previous relationship,” the actress explained. situation the newspaper Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger.

Franz Beckenbauer with his first wife, Brigitte Wittmann, at an event in Munich, 1976 (Heinz Browers/United via Getty Images)

With Brigitte he had two other children, Michael and Stephan, who died at the age of 46 after being diagnosed with a brain tumor. “I don’t know if I will ever be able to accept it,” he would declare in 2015 about this blow, repeating a similar idea years later when cataloging this painful event as “the greatest loss of my life.”

Meanwhile, that relationship, which seemed unbreakable, was allegedly dissolved by the appearance of a third party in discord. They separated in 1977 but divorced in 1990. In the meantime, Beckenbauer had fallen in love with Diana Sandmann, a sports photographer with whom he went to live in New York after his move to Cosmos in the United States. “During this marriage he began an affair with sports photographer Diana Sandmann, which eventually became a long-lasting relationship and from which he also separated after 11 years,” they summarized it in an article by Bunte. “I had met her at the wedding of her manager Robert Schwans,” they added in the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger.

The love affair of the two-time Ballon d’Or winner with Diana, whom German media classified as “the most passionate”, was consolidated in the Big Apple, where the new couple appeared at major events alongside world stars such as Pelé, Mick Jagger, Luciano Pavarotti and Plácido Domingo, among others. But again, after more than a decade of relationship, the Emperor once again bet on love when he met Sybille, with whom he starred in the second official wedding of his life in 1990 when he was already coaching the German team.

Not everything went as expected and the relationship broke down amid a scandal over a child out of wedlock that Beckenbauer had with his Bayern Munich secretary, two decades younger. The news became public in 2000 when Franz was working in the Bavarian team and generated a stir. The woman in question would end up being his third and last wife: Heidi Burmester. In the midst of the scandal, the then coach of the most powerful team in the country had a phrase that is still remembered in those lands: “The crime is not that big. God rejoices for every child.” In 2006, the year of the World Cup held in Germany, the two married and had a daughter, Francesca, who joined Joel-Maximilian in the new family.

But the most controversial points of Kaiser’s life off the court were not only at the level of the heart. In 2006 a scandal broke out as a result of the World Cup that was held in Germany and had Franz as a star: “Beckenbauer, then president of the organizing committee, was considered the ambassador of the German “summer fairy tale” in the World Cup and was considered the “national Sunday boy.” But after the euphoric football festival, serious accusations of corruption against the Kaiser emerged. Did the World Cup celebration, which the former Bayern professional so famously brought to Germany, come with a price? There were accusations of bribery and illicit payments,” they described in Bunte. The renowned media outlet Der Spiegel even stated after an investigation that Beckenbauer seemed to be related to payments greater than 5 million euros in “still unknown concepts.” “I never encouraged anyone to be paid money to buy votes for Germany to host the 2006 World Cup,” he defended himself.

With the power of the scandals now appeased, Franz spent his last years fighting an illness and in the company of his partner, Heidi. The 57-year-old woman ended up being the most important woman for Beckenbauer and the one who accompanied him until his last days on this plane and who will be in charge of the German defender’s inheritance. “His wife is now especially powerful,” they indicated in Bunte, since the former captain of the world champion team in the tournament that was held in his country in 74 gave his last partner the right to approve the sale of the properties to your name. In addition to making that decision, Franz also expressed that his children Joel (23) and Francesca (20) received large parts of his estate before his death. It is estimated that the fortune amassed by the Kaiser was 80 million euros.

Franz Beckenbauer with his last wife, Heidi Burmester (EFE)
2024-01-17 05:04:00
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