Uwe Rösler, the former East Germany striker who became a Manchester City hero, has high hopes for League One side
In the early Premier League days of the mid-1990s Uwe Rösler was in his own way a Manchester City version of Eric Cantona. Less regal, less pretentious – less successful – but still powerfully bonded to the club's support, a Sky Blue hero among the first wave of foreign players in the new top tier. If Cantona's arrival was the signal for a generational boom at United, while Rösler-era City were facing serial relegation, in retirement the contrast between the two is even more pronounced.
Rösler was appointed manager of League One Brentford in June. Five league games into his re-entry into English football he looks both chasteningly lithe and entirely at home strolling around eating an apple in the definitively non-Hollywood surroundings of Griffin Park.
When Rösler sprints off to hurl his apple core over a wall before he has his photo taken, two thoughts occur: first, he is very close to putting it through someone's living room window (Griffin Park is that kind of ground); and secondly he looks like he could still be out there doing a job for the team if it came to it. This is a significant achievement in itself for a man who almost lost his life to cancer in 2003. And if there is still a mild sense of incongruity to the sight of this tall, gentlemanly, charismatic former Premier League star taking charge of west London's homeliest minor power, then it is worth bearing in mind that Rösler's entire career has been a process of peripatetic reinvention.
This is, after all, a man who played international football five times for a country that no longer exists. As with many East Germans, the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1990 seems to have left a certain sense of displacement. "People ask me where is your home and I always say I am a European," Rösler says. "My wife is Norwegian. I have my roots in Germany. And I had my most enjoyable time in England. I feel at home here.
"In one way I was very happy that the Wall fell down. There was a lot of possibilities. On the other hand I realised it was probably the end of my international career, particularly with West Germany winning the World Cup in 1990. I was competing with Rudi Völler, Jürgen Klinsmann, Oliver Bierhof."
In 1994, aged 26, Rösler was signed for City from FC Nuremberg by Brian Horton. English football had exercised a fascination from the time Rösler was sent to a football school of excellence in Leipzig aged 11. "We had tapes we would listen to in the evening of the English crowds, just the songs. It was amazing. That was where my interest in English football started. In East Germany you couldn't watch it then, so we had the noise instead."
"I loved it when I came here. English football is poor. It is honest. It is fast and direct. In the 90s it was not so much about tactics, it was like two boxers hitting each other until one fell down. As a striker, I knew I would get a lot of chances. In Germany there was a lot of man-marking and sweepers, it was much harder to score."
Rösler scored 50 goals in 150 matches for City, but in retrospect it is easy to visualise his career pegged out around a series of thrillingly unhinged moments. There was the brilliant goal in a losing cause against United in the FA Cup, complete with wild, gesticulating celebration towards his manager, Alan Ball, who had left him out of the team ("I would not think it good if a player did that to me now"). Plus the incident where Rösler hurled his boots into the City fans at the end of a 6-0 defeat in his final game ("The supporters were encouraging us. That was a goodwill gesture. But not everybody saw it that way").
The links with City are still strong (during our conversation Rösler briefly takes a phone call from his old striking partner Paul Walsh). The club helped him find a school for his children in Manchester when he returned to England in April, and his youngest son is now at the City academy. Rösler believes the current first-team are realistic title contenders. Which of them would he most like to have played alongside?
"David Silva. I'm a big fan. He makes City click offensively. But I also am a big fan of [Nigel] De Jong and [Vincent] Kompany and Joey Hart. To make that transition to the first team under pressure and then to perform like he did was unbelievably brave."
Bravery is something Rösler is well placed to talk about. In 2003, shortly after scoring the winner for Lillestrom SK in the first match of the Norwegian season, he was diagnosed with an aggressive tumour in his chest and told that without immediate surgery he might not survive. "My first thought was, 'Why me?'" When you've been in an area where everything is based on healthy people, I'd never came across people who had been sick or in hospital fighting for their lives. It was a totally new experience.
"I just tried to survive. I believe you can overcome cancer to a certain degree by being very positive mentally, trusting the doctors and the treatment. That mental aspect is so strong in healing your body."
Rösler is now "fully fit – 100%" and pouring his palpable energies into life at Brentford.
The job offer came via a recommendation from another mid-1990s Mancunian import, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, who succeeded Rösler as Molde manager and then came into contact with the Brentford chairman, Matthew Benham, an online betting tycoon, via the Under-19 Champions League, which Benham is involved in staging.
"This club is perfect for me," Rösler says. "It's how football started in England, back to the roots, an old-fashioned stadium with the houses on either side. Also, when we play good football and get good results, we will fill the stadium and it can be intimidating in here."
This will no doubt be taken in a spirit of wry optimism by Brentford fans, for whom the notion of intimidatory full houses is perhaps a little further down the wishlist than a little stability and a push for a playoff spot.
Rösler does, though, have plans for Brentford. Under Benham the impetus is towards establishing the club's academy, a vision of grooming young talent by which Rösler is greatly enthused. Already Jack Reeves, an 18-year-old midfielder, has impressed in the first team in an injury crisis. "We have two or three very good talents in our development squad and for the whole club it's great if we can make that link with the first team.
"You have to go step by step. You need a good foundation. This is a big chance for me and I want to make it count. I'm on this road and I want to see how far it can go."
