A post in which Jens Lehmann is being awesome
So Mad Jens retired from football a couple of weeks ago. And about half a year ago his fansite and lj community came up with the idea to make a little farewell present for him. Thanks to onlinegooner btw. for telling the Arsenal fans about it! Fans had the opportunity to write letters, little stories, do artwork and so on, send it in and we compiled it into a book and got it printed. We received contributions from all over the world: Germany, England, Scotland, Ireland, Russia, USA, Chile, Venezuela, Argentinia, China and Southafrica and also a couple of thoughtful presents, a matrjoschka from Russia for example, with the whole Lehmann family painted on.
Now the real problem was to present the stuff to him because VfB Stuttgart was practically overrun with interview requests and so on for Lehmann in the last couple of weeks of the season so there was actually some kind of contact ban. A big thank-you goes out to a very insistent VfB fan and someone from the club itself who managed to do this behind the back of the club's press office, errm.
So in the end our gift bearer got to meet an initially very grumpy Jens (cold and completely soaked from training) and waited for him in front of the dressing room (not without one of the players running out on the hallway butt-nekkit but that is another story *g*). When he came out he was still in Mad Jens-mode but when he saw what it was all about he became a different person. I think his state could best be described with Permanent-Squee. :D
He had a look at everything in the box, looked through the book and let your dear VfB fan take a couple of pictures. And immediately started to ponder about how he could say thank you. He quickly decideded to film a little video to thank everyone for the gifts. Not only do I know how many people, some at the other end of the world he made really happy with this, I also appreciate it because he's not really into that whole video/interview stuff. Actually the VfB media boss had been trying to hunt him down for days to film a farewell interview which Jens had been avoiding successfully but now he was the one who asked the media guy to film everything right on the next day (the guy couldn't believe his luck XD). So he sort of did it despite himself. Thanks Jens! :D It's now running on VfB-TV and their Youtube channel.
Talking to the media guy about the video...
Hehe, when he's nevous his accent comes through. He says a bit more in German where he also mentions the matjroschka. And apparently he started reading our book right away and says it was exceptional that he got those gifts and that he was very very happy about them. Tells you that even someone like Lehmann who has probably seen.. well, almost everything is happy about some thoughtful appriciation from the fans. What they usually get in Germany is an edding shoved up their nose to sign stuff.
PS: Direct link to the video in case the inbedded one doesn't work.
Now the real problem was to present the stuff to him because VfB Stuttgart was practically overrun with interview requests and so on for Lehmann in the last couple of weeks of the season so there was actually some kind of contact ban. A big thank-you goes out to a very insistent VfB fan and someone from the club itself who managed to do this behind the back of the club's press office, errm.
So in the end our gift bearer got to meet an initially very grumpy Jens (cold and completely soaked from training) and waited for him in front of the dressing room (not without one of the players running out on the hallway butt-nekkit but that is another story *g*). When he came out he was still in Mad Jens-mode but when he saw what it was all about he became a different person. I think his state could best be described with Permanent-Squee. :D
He had a look at everything in the box, looked through the book and let your dear VfB fan take a couple of pictures. And immediately started to ponder about how he could say thank you. He quickly decideded to film a little video to thank everyone for the gifts. Not only do I know how many people, some at the other end of the world he made really happy with this, I also appreciate it because he's not really into that whole video/interview stuff. Actually the VfB media boss had been trying to hunt him down for days to film a farewell interview which Jens had been avoiding successfully but now he was the one who asked the media guy to film everything right on the next day (the guy couldn't believe his luck XD). So he sort of did it despite himself. Thanks Jens! :D It's now running on VfB-TV and their Youtube channel.
Talking to the media guy about the video...
Hehe, when he's nevous his accent comes through. He says a bit more in German where he also mentions the matjroschka. And apparently he started reading our book right away and says it was exceptional that he got those gifts and that he was very very happy about them. Tells you that even someone like Lehmann who has probably seen.. well, almost everything is happy about some thoughtful appriciation from the fans. What they usually get in Germany is an edding shoved up their nose to sign stuff.
PS: Direct link to the video in case the inbedded one doesn't work.