Udo Lattek and His Unmatched Record in European Football

We've already reviewed the careers of several of the best managers in the history of football, and we couldn't leave out Udo Lattek, one of the most successful managers in football and the most successful in the history of the German Bundesliga. To his great successes (and there were many), we must add a particular record, one that only Jose Mourinho could match many decades later: winning all three UEFA competitions with three different teams. This is an example of how the German manager triumphed almost everywhere he went.

Bayer Leverkusen was one of the club's Lattek player for

The Beginnings

Udo Lattek was born on January 16, 1935, in the city of Bosemb, which is currently Polish territory but was then part of Germany. While studying to become a teacher, he also pursued his career as a football player, where he also played as a striker. He became relatively famous for his excellent header, which allowed him to score a significant number of goals while playing for teams such as Osnabruck and Bayer Leverkusen. He retired relatively young (at 30 years old) and immediately began his career with the German Football Association.

There, he began his career as a coach of the youth national teams and as an assistant to Helmut Schon with the main national team. In this role, he was part of the staff that reached the final of the 1966 World Cup in England, which they lost to the host country. At the Mannschaft, he worked alongside youngsters Franz Beckenbauer, Sepp Maier, and Gerd Müller. In the 1969-70 season, Bayern Munich was coached by Branko Zebec, who had already led the team to a double the previous season but was struggling with both results and the dressing room atmosphere. This led the Bayern board to dismiss him in March 1970 and hire Lattek.

The Golden Era of Bayern and Gladbach

His relationship with Maier, Muller, and especially Beckenbauer, who recommended him to the Bayern board to coach the Bavarian first team, was one of the main reasons the club decided to hire him. The idea was to change the difficult atmosphere in the locker room into a more harmonious one, transforming it into success. The beginning of his tenure as Bayern manager was viewed with scrutiny by the media and fans alike due to the fact that he was taking over an important position without any experience as a head manager.

That first half-season saw them win the DFB Pokal, and they would go on to win the next three Bundesliga titles. However, their greatest success came in 1974, when Bayern reached their first European Cup final, against another debutant at that stage, Atlético Madrid. The match was played at the Heysel Stadium in Brussels and ended 0-0 after 90 minutes. In extra time, Luis Aragones scored for the Spanish team in the 114th minute, and just when it seemed Atlético would be the champions, the Bavarian team equalized in the 120th minute through Schwarzenbeck.

This forced a replay two days later at the same venue. This time, the match wasn't as evenly matched, as Bayern won 4-0 with braces from Uli Hoeness and Gerd Muller. This would be the first of three consecutive European Cups the club would win, although it was the only one in which Lattek would manage. Udo was a strong-willed man who didn't want the board to be involved in team decisions, so he even had issues with some members of the board, leading to his dismissal, despite the team's excellent form and achievements.

The following season, he signed with Borussia Mönchengladbach, a German powerhouse at the time. They had just won the Bundesliga, and would do so again with Lattek on the bench in his first season with Gladbach. In fact, his first two seasons in his new role resulted in two Bundesliga titles. However, arguably his greatest success with Gladbach was the UEFA Cup title they won in the 1978-79 season, defeating Crvena Zvezda (Serbian Red Star Belgrade) in the final after a replay. His spell at Gladbach lasted four seasons, which also included a European Cup final in 1977, in which they lost 3-1 to Paisley and Keegan's Liverpool.

In 1979, he left Borussia Mönchengladbach for another and signed with Borussia Dortmund, where he remained for two seasons, finishing sixth and seventh in the Bundesliga. Lattek, who had previously coached Hoeness, Maier, Muller, and Beckenabuer at Bayern and Stilike, Heynckes, Simonsen, and Wimmer at Gladbach, said that Dortmund lacked talented players at the time who would allow him to aspire to greater heights. During that time, his 15-year-old son died of leukemia, which also affected him and led him to look for other opportunities abroad.

In Spain Lattek was the manager for FC Barcelona for two seasons

The Spanish Adventure

Thus, in 1981, he became the second German to coach FC Barcelona, after Hennes Weisweiler (whom Lattek replaced at Gladbach) had done so six seasons earlier. His time in Catalonia was somewhat complicated, as his strong character clashed with that of the board, which, according to Lattek himself, wanted to make team decisions as if they were the managers, and with that of some key players in the dressing room, such as his compatriot Bernd Schuster and Diego Maradona.

In his first season with FC Barcelona, they finished second in the league after leading the standings for much of the year, following a four-game losing streak at the end of the season. However, that same year they won the European Cup Winners' Cup, defeating Standard Liège in the final. This allowed him to become the first manager to win all three UEFA competitions (now joined by Giovanni Trapattoni and Jose Mourinho) and also to retain his position, which was in doubt following what happened in the league.

In its second season, the Catalan club signed Maradona with whom it did not have a good relationship. Once, Lattek ordered the club bus driver to start the journey even though Maradona hadn't arrived yet.

"I couldn't wait any longer for him; he was always late, my authority was at stake, and the other players applauded me, but the next day Maradona spoke with the president, and my days were numbered".

He also had problems with Schuster (Lattek called him a drunk) and all of this resulted in him not finishing his second season with Barcelona.

Back to Germany

Uli Hoeness was forced to retire in 1979 and was immediately appointed general manager of Bayern Munich. Thanks to his good relationship with Lattek, he proposed that the manager return to the Bavarian club in 1983. It's often said that second half times aren't always great, but this was the exception, as Lattek would go on to win three Bundesliga titles and two DFB Pokals in his four seasons at Bayern, where he featured players like Lothar Matthäus and Rummenigge. He then decided to temporarily retire from coaching in 1987, although he returned to football in 1991 as Sporting Director of 1. FC Koln. Interestingly, he was asked to take charge of a single match against Bayern, which ended in a draw. He returned to coaching directly in 1992, at Schalke, although he only stayed for half a season.

Once again, he decided to retire from coaching and focused on working as a sports commentator and newspaper columnist. However, coaching called once again, and this time it was to an old acquaintance, Borussia Dortmund, with whom he would end his managerial career, this time definitively, in 2000. Dortmund was one point away from relegation with five Bundesliga games remaining, and Lattek was offered the job of saving them. The manager accepted, and what is known to have been a very good contract, earned him two wins and two draws (the only defeat was against Bayern) in those last five matchdays, completing his mission of avoiding relegation.

The Final Years and His Passing

After definitively ending his managerial career, Udo Lattek lived a more withdrawn life, but his experience and forthright opinions made him a respected voice in German football long after he had left the touchline.

In his final years, Lattek suffered from Parkinson's disease as well as dementia, which gradually affected his health until he passed away on January 31, 2015, at the age of 80. With his death, the football world lost one of its most successful and influential managers, whose achievements and legacy remain truly unique in European football history.