Pierre Littbarski Fortune

Short introduction

Pierre Littbarski is a former professional footballer who became world champion with Germany in 1990. Most of the time he played for 1. FC Köln, but was also active in France and Japan. After his career, he held various football roles, was at times a coach and assistant coach, and has been a brand ambassador for VfL Wolfsburg for some time now, where he was previously head of scouting.

Early life

In what was then West Berlin, Pierre Littbarski was born in 1960 and grew up mostly with his grandparents. He played football in the club early on, namely from 1967. First at VfL Schöneberg until 1976, then at Hertha Zehlendorf, with whom he became German runner-up in 1978. From 1978 he was under contract with 1. FC Köln, where he was sold for DM 13,000. He made his debut in the Bundesliga on August 26, 1978, and another 21 seasons as a professional football player were to follow for Pierre Littbarski.

Career

In his first season Littbarski played 16 of 34 possible league appearances and was also active in the European Cup for 1. FC Köln. The following season, the only 1.68-meter offensive player became a regular in Cologne. The same was true for the U21 national team in Germany. However, he and his club lost the 1980 final in the DFB Cup 1: 2 against Fortuna Düsseldorf. He was supposed to win this missed title in 1983 when he scored the only goal for a 1-0 win against local rival Fortuna Köln in the home stadium of Müngersdorf.

Previously, he had made the final breakthrough even after the number of hits. In the 1981/82 season he scored 15 goals in the Bundesliga. Consequently, he also drove to the 1982 World Cup in Spain, where he became Vice World Champion with colleagues like Karl-Heinz Rummenigge and Paul Breitner. He had already made his debut in the senior team in 1981 in a 3-1 win over Austria, where he scored two goals in his first game.

The same success should be repeated by Pierre Littbarski in 1986 when he was again runner-up with the DFB selection. In 1990 he even made a big splash when he became world champion 1-0 over Argentina under team manager Franz Beckenbauer.

In the club, he quickly canceled a short trip to France for a season to the Racing Club Paris. Despite 34 appearances, he only managed 4 goals for the capital. He is said to have paid part of the transfer fee when he moved back to 1. FC Köln. During his time at this club between 1978 and 1993, he was used 406 times in the Bundesliga, scoring 116 goals, which still places him in the top 50 of the Bundesliga ‘s list of top goalscorers.

Pierre Littbarski then moved to JEF United Chiba in Japan for two years, where he added another season to Brummell Sendai before ending his career as a player. In Japan he gained great popularity due to his open but often mischievous nature, which continues to this day.

He then had various coaching posts in both German and Japanese football. So he coached MSV Duisburg, Yokohama FC, in Australia even Sydney FC, and most recently was assistant coach at VfL Wolfsburg. However, the big successes in these occupations did not materialize – he did not win a single title as a coach and was taken several times early.

At the 2002 World Cup he was a co-commentator for the World Cup games in Japan at RTL, from 2012 to 2018 he was head of scouting at VfL Wolfsburg. Since then he has been working as a brand ambassador for this club.

Career highlights

The absolute highlight of Pierre Littbarski’s career was, of course, winning the World Cup in 1990 after he had already been runner-up twice. Otherwise, he won the DFB Cup in 1983. In addition, with 18 goals in 21 international matches with the U21 of Germany, he is still their record scorer. As a particularly great, non-sporting success, Pierre Littbarksi can count on the fact that he was popular in Germany and Japan far beyond the supporters of his respective clubs. With his very playful way of celebrating football, especially in impressive dribbles, he won hearts here as well as being free from pretensions and blessed with a certain motherly joke.

Famous quotes

“In the first half we played quite well, in the second we lacked continuity …, uh Kontuni …, oh shitty foreign words: we weren’t consistent enough!”

“If we continue like this, we might be able to pick up where we want to go.”

“Rudi Völler would have transformed that with a leg in plaster.”

Amazing facts

In 1989 he was appointed by the CDU in North Rhine-Westphalia to elect Richard von Weizsäcker as Federal President to the Federal Assembly, where he also participated.

In Japan he is extremely popular as “Litti”, among other things he appears as such in a Japanese textbook.

In 2018 he appeared as a guest in the series “Dittsche”, playing himself.