German football legend Franz Beckenbauer has passed away at the age of 78, media reports said on Monday.
The German football great helped his country win the Football World Cup both as player and as a coach.
“It is with deep sadness that we announce that my husband and our father, Franz Beckenbauer, passed away peacefully in his sleep yesterday, Sunday, surrounded by his family,” Beckenbauer’s family said in a statement to German media organisation dpa. “We ask that we be allowed grieve in peace and spared any questions.”
The statement did not provide a cause of death.
As a player and coach, Beckenbauer did more than most to shape German football. He captained West Germany to the World Cup title in 1974. He also coached the national side that won the 1990 World Cup final against Argentina.
Nicknamed “Der Kaiser”, he won numerous other honours, including a hat-trick of European Cups with Bayern Munich in the 1970s.
He was born on September 11, 1945, months after Germany’s surrender in World War II, in the working-class Munich district of Giesing. The son of a post official, studied to become an insurance salesman. However, he signed his first professional contract with Bayern Munich when he was just 18 years of age.
While his career took him to pitstops in countries like the United States 9where he played for the New York Cosmos in the late 1970s and early 1980s), he is popularly known for revolutionising the position of “libero,” a free-roaming, marauding defender who could venture forward to threaten the opponent’s goal as well.
Today, 41 years ago: Win against the Netherlands! WORLD CHAMPION! A great moment! pic.twitter.com/rSVFrho2zE
— Franz Beckenbauer (@beckenbauer) July 7, 2015
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Beckenbauer’s death comes just two days after another football legend, Mario Zagallo, passed away. The Brazilian was the first person to win the World Cup as a player and coach.
Goal of the Day for today takes us back to the 1966 World Cup and a goal by a very young Franz Beckenbauer (The Kaiser). Here he shows how simple and beautiful the game can be. pic.twitter.com/NZXkTHq1UT
— TJS Sports (@SportsTjs) July 11, 2020
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Beckenbauer was one of the central figures behind Germany winning the hosting rights of the 2006 World Cup, which turned out to be a highly successful one. However, his legacy was stained by bribery charges. At the age of 71, he was questioned by Swiss prosecutors in March 2017 over suspected corruption with regards to Germany winning hosting rights. He denied the allegations. “We did not want to bribe anyone and we didn’t bribe anyone,” Beckenbauer, who headed the organising committee for the 2006 World Cup, wrote in a column for German tabloid Bild in 2016.
He was not indicted in 2019 for health reasons while the case ended without a judgment when the statute of limitations expired in 2020 amid delays to the court system caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
(With inputs from The Associated Press)
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