Watzke's Support for Tuchel Post-World Cup
Hans-Joachim Watzke wanted Thomas Tuchel to take over the German national team in the immediate aftermath of the 2022 World Cup disaster in Qatar – and says he later recommended him for the England job.
The long-serving Borussia Dortmund chief, who has been DFB vice president since 2022, revealed in an interview with Sky Germany that he spent sleepless nights thinking about a change on the touchline after Germany’s group-stage exit.
“We were eliminated in Qatar quite miserably. And then? Then you think at night or for two nights, what could be now?” Watzke recalled.
Flick stays, Tuchel waits
Inside the DFB, though, the mood was different. Hansi Flick, who had only been in charge since 2021, survived the post-World Cup inquest.
“Oliver Bierhoff was still there at the time. It was not my decision who would be national coach,” Watzke explained. “But the basic attitude was simple: We’ll continue with Hansi Flick. And Hansi is an excellent coach; you can see what he’s doing at Barcelona.”
Watzke felt the warning signs were bigger than just an early exit. The performances, not just the results, worried him. The national team looked flat, short of conviction, short of ideas. For him, that was exactly the kind of moment when a demanding, detail-obsessed coach like Tuchel could have reset the culture.
Instead, Germany doubled down on continuity. Flick stayed. Tuchel, for the time being, remained on the outside.
Old wounds, lasting respect
Watzke knows Tuchel as well as anyone in German football. The pair worked together at Borussia Dortmund from 2015 to 2017, a spell that brought the DFB Pokal but ended in acrimony.
Tuchel was dismissed shortly after lifting the cup, with tensions boiling over around Dortmund’s Champions League quarter-final against Monaco in 2017. The team were ordered to play the home leg just a day after a bomb attack on their bus. Tuchel publicly criticised the decision and the club’s handling of the situation, a rift that eventually cost him his job.
From the outside, that split looked terminal. Watzke insists the story that reached the public never told the whole truth – and that the relationship did not die with Tuchel’s exit.
He stressed that he has always understood the strain Tuchel was under in those days.
“Anyone who knows Tuchel as a personality also knows that he also imposes this pressure on himself,” Watzke said. “And as I said, I always had respect for it in the end, even in retrospect, because I don’t know if, when you were sitting on the bus at that moment, things felt different for you. After all, you just have to respect that.”
It is a rare, pointed acknowledgement from a club boss who lived through that night and its fallout. The scars remain, but so does the respect.
A German recommendation for England’s man
Years later, Tuchel’s path circled back to Watzke in a different way. Before Tuchel was appointed England manager, the DFB vice president was sounded out about his former coach. His verdict was clear: a strong recommendation.
The same man he wanted to see rebuild a broken Germany after Qatar is now charged with guiding England’s golden generation. Watzke could only watch as that opportunity slipped away from his own federation.
Germany chose stability. England chose Tuchel. The next tournaments will show who read the moment better.
