Soccer Most dangerous player
Popp transcends anything previously imaginable in women’s football
Status: 5:17 p.m. | Reading time: 5 minutes
By Robert Schreier, Erik Peters, Lars Wallrodt
“She’s more than a gift for us,” says Joti Chatzialexiou, sporting director of the national teams at the DFB, about Alexandra Popp
Credit: AFP/WILLIAM WEST
Alexandra Popp is not only the most dangerous player in the DFB selection. She is also probably the most popular footballer that Germany has ever had. At the Women’s World Cup, facets of her come to light that you didn’t know about her before – and didn’t hear about before.
The status of an athlete is shown, among other things, by how the public reacts to the possible end of a career. From a shrug of the shoulders to collective world pain from the fans, anything is possible. According to this indicator, the popularity of national soccer player Alexandra Popp, 32, seems to be in good order. At the World Cup, which is currently being held in Australia and New Zealand, she was recently asked about possible plans for the time after the World Cup. Specifically: Would you resign if you won the title? “That can be,” answered “Poppi” honestly.
Well, there was a rush in the forest of papers, and digitally the Internet crackled with excitement. The reaction to the eventuality was downright shocking, even if Popp quickly asserted that this decision would depend on her “gut feeling after the World Cup”. So Popp’s stomach will still play an important role in this tournament – but at the moment it’s more about her head. With that, she scored Germany’s first two goals in the opening game against Morocco last Monday, putting her team on the road to an unchallenged 6-0 win. “It’s crazy how she keeps her head clean. You just have a good feeling with ‘Poppi’ on the pitch,” says fellow player Jule Brand casually. On Sunday, in the second group game against Colombia (11.30 a.m., in the sports ticker of the WELT), the group victory is already at stake, the South Americans won their first game against South Korea 2-0.
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Popp will then return as a striker, it will be her 130th cap in which she will hopefully score her 65th goal. Their importance for the selection of the German Football Association (DFB) can hardly be overestimated. Of course, she causes a sensation with her goal threat. At last year’s European Championships in England, she scored at least one goal in all three group games, as well as in the quarter-finals and semi-finals. No other player had ever managed that at a European Championship. And the fact that Germany lost the final against the English hosts is also attributed to the fact that Popp missed the final due to a muscle injury sustained in final training. Since then, her popularity rating has surpassed anything previously imaginable in women’s football.
“Their greed to win is and will remain unbroken”
As a team captain, Popp is also a leading figure far beyond the sporting side. “She’s the leader on and off the field,” says the currently injured national player Giulia Gwinn: “Her greed to win is and will remain unbroken. Above all, her header is unique and her eye for goal is phenomenal.” Winger Brand agrees: “She’s a prime example of how to support the team. She’s the kind of person you just have to laugh with when she’s in a good mood. She is fun for everyone. You can learn a lot from her.”
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Joti Chatzialexiou, sporting director of the national teams at the DFB, is enthusiastic about the striker: “She is an exceptional athlete and a very important player for us. ‘Poppi’ is simply unique with her presence on the pitch, but also in the way she leads the team. I’m really a fan of hers because she also portrays our virtues. She’s a classic centre-forward and a player who leads the way.”
One that leads the way: Alexandra Popp
Source: Memmler/Eibner-Pressefoto/picture alliance
Despite all the rip-off in front of the opposing goal, Popp is also a sensitive person. In the game against Morocco, she celebrated her two goals with a gesture that raised questions. She had already celebrated at the World Cup four years ago by forming a telephone receiver with her thumb and little finger and pointing it to the sky. When she called, she was asked after the Morocco game: “The one who answered is my father,” she revealed. He recently passed away, Popp commemorated him with her telephone cheers: “I don’t just want to reach the people on the screens, but above all the people who can no longer be with us and who are or were very important to me. I just want to show that I’m thinking of her.”
It was a rare glimpse into her innermost being that Popp gave. Despite all the publicity that her job entails, she is not one to show her private life to the outside world. Little is even known about their relationship status. In 2021 she is said to have married her longtime partner Patrick, which Popp has neither confirmed nor denied to this day. And on Friday, BILD reported that the couple, who are said to have lived together in Wolfsburg until then, where Popp has been chasing goals for VfL since 2012, have separated. Popp only said that she basically does not make any statements about her private life. The fact that BILD brought the separation as the main headline on page one shows the importance of the exceptional player.
The front page of Friday’s BILD
Source: IMAGE
“After the EM 2022, a lot of attention was drawn to her, which she doesn’t necessarily want. I know that she sometimes finds it exhausting to be recognized in her free time,” says her teammate Lena Lattwein: “I have the greatest respect for how she manages all her sponsorship appointments and her duties as captain both at the club and at the DFB . Despite this time investment, she always delivers, is down-to-earth and modest and also likes to stay in the background from time to time. She always has to work, but she never seems tired and is always in a good mood.”
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The acclaimed striker, meanwhile, prefers to focus on the World Cup she would love to win on her fourth attempt. Because while they celebrated two Champions League victories, seven championships and a total of twelve cup victories with Wolfsburg (two of them with FRC 2001 Frankfurt), the national team has only one Olympic victory on their credit side and second place at the last European Championship. Should it actually work out with the final victory on August 20th in Sydney, a resignation at the peak of their work would at least be logical. Even if pretty much everything would be done at the DFB to keep the female figurehead. “I would get on my knees and ask that she continue after the tournament,” says sports director Chatzialexiou: “She is more than a gift for us.”
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In order to display embedded content, your revocable consent to the transmission and processing of personal data is required, since the providers of the embedded content as third-party providers require this consent [In diesem Zusammenhang können auch Nutzungsprofile (u.a. auf Basis von Cookie-IDs) gebildet und angereichert werden, auch außerhalb des EWR]. By setting the switch to “on”, you agree to this (which can be revoked at any time). This also includes your consent to the transfer of certain personal data to third countries, including the USA, in accordance with Art. 49 (1) (a) GDPR. You can find more information about this. You can withdraw your consent at any time via the switch and via privacy at the bottom of the page.