Michael Schjønberg

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Michael Schjønberg
Personal information
Full name Michael Schjønberg Christensen
Date of birth January 19, 1967
Place of birth Esbjerg, Denmark
Position Coach (former wingback)
Club information
Current club Hannover 96
Professional clubs*
Years Club Apps (goals)
19??-1990
1990-1994
1994-1996
1996-2001		 Esbjerg fB
Hannover 96
Odense BK
Kaiserslautern
123 (12)

117 (13)
National team
1995-2000 Denmark 44 (3)
Teams managed
2003-2004
2004-2005
2005-2006
2006-		 Kaiserslautern (youth)
Herfølge BK
Hannover 96 (assistant)
Hanover 96 II

* Professional club appearances and goals
counted for the domestic league only.

Michael Schjønberg Christensen (born January 19, 1967 in Esbjerg) is a Danish former professional football (soccer) player who played 44 games and scored three goals for the Denmark national football team, and was a participant at the international 1995 King Fahd Cup, Euro 1996, 1998 FIFA World Cup, and Euro 2000 tournaments. After suffering a career-ending injury in 2001, he became a football coach in 2003.

Contents

[edit] Biography

Schjønberg started his career as an attacking midfielder for hometown club Esbjerg fB. He and Esbjerg teammate Jesper Kristensen went to a training session with Esbjerg native Allan Nielsen in Nielsen's German club Bayern Munich in the winter 1989. When Bayern's amateur team coach Hans-Dieter Schmidt later became manager of Hannover 96, he remembered Schjønberg and offered him a contract.[1] In 1991, Schjønberg moved abroad to play for Hannover 96 in the secondary 2nd Bundesliga division.

[edit] First triumph

At Hannover, he was re-schooled as a defensive player, and eventually settled in as left wingback.[1] He won his first trophy as a senior player, when the club most surprisingly beat Borussia Mönchengladbach, from the top-flight 1st Bundesliga championship, and won the 1992 DFB-Pokal cup tournament. The game ended in a penalty shoot-out, where Schjønberg scored the deciding goal to scure the triumph for Hannover.[2] Unhappy with a new contractual offer from Hannover, Schjønberg looked ready to move back to Denmark to play for Odense BK in the summer 1992. After the DFB-Pokal win, he got an improved contract, and became Hannover 96 team captain. However, he had a hard time getting into the Danish national team. After 123 league games and 12 goals for Hannover 96, he looked around for a new club in the summer 1994.

[edit] Back in Denmark

Schjønberg moved to Odense BK in 1994, in a transfer deal worth DKK 700,000. The transfer came, as Schjønberg felt more likely to secure a place in the Danish national team when playing for a Danish club.[3] With Odense, he reached the quarter-final in the 1994-95 edition of the international UEFA Cup tournament. It was Odense's greatest international result, as the club eliminated Spanish club Real Madrid before being narrowly defeated by Italian club AC Parma in the quarter-finals.

He made his debut for the Danish national team in the 1995 King Fahd Cup in January 1995. He played all Denmark's three matches at the tournament, which Denmark won. He was also selected for the 1996 European Championship (Euro 1996), where he played in Denmark's last two games before elimination.

[edit] Kaiserslautern

After Euro 1996, he moved back to Germany, to play for 2nd Bundesliga team 1. FC Kaiserslautern in a transfer deal worth DEM 1,35 million.[4] In his first year at the club, Kaiserslautern won promotion to the 1st Bundesliga. Schjønberg was an important part of the Kaiserslautern team which went on to win the 1997-98 1st Bundesliga championship. He scored the club's very first goal of the 1997-98 season, in the match day 1 game against defending 1st Bundesliga champions Bayern Munich. Ten minutes before end time, Schjønberg headed the ball in after a cross from Swiss midfielder Ciriaco Sforza and secured a 1-0 win. This victory was the beginning of the Kaiserslautern fairy tale, and Schjønberg went on to play 32 of 34 league games and score four goals, as the club became the first ever 2nd Bundesliga promotees to immediately win the 1st Bundesliga title.

Schjønberg was selected to play for Denmark at the 1998 World Cup in France, where he played four of Denmark's five matches before elimination. He began the tournament as Denmark's starting left wingback, but eventually lost the place to Jan Heintze as the tournament progressed. Returning to Kaiserslautern after the World Cup, Schjønberg was heavily injured early in the 1998-99 season. In a September 1998 game against VfL Bochum, Schjønberg collided with opposition goalkeeper Thomas Ernst, and broke his shinbone. He underwent a seven-month recovery and returned in April 1999.

Schjønberg made a memorable appearance in the 33rd match day of the 1999-00 season. In the game against SC Freiburg, first-choice goalkeeper Georg Koch was injured and the substitute goalkeeper Uwe Gospodarek replaced him. At the half-time break, Gosporadek had suffered an injury on his own, and with no more goalkeepers selected for the match squad, Schjønberg took over the keeper's gloves. In the 59th minute, Levan Kobiashvili scored against Schjønberg to give Freiburg a 2-1 lead, but Schjønberg played an otherwise error-free game as goalkeeper. He crowned his achievement with a saved penalty kick, when he held the shot from Alexander Iashvili in the 84th minute.[5]

He was called up to represent Denmark at the Euro 2000 tournament, and started in Denmark's three matches before elimination. The last group stage match against the Czech Republic on 21 June 2000, would be Schjønberg's last game for the national team. In Kaiserslautern's 2000-01 season, he suffered another injury early on, in an August 2000 game against VfL Wolfsburg. He returned from recovery in December that year, and eventually got his place back in the starting line-up. Due to old injuries and acute knee problems, he had to promptly terminate his football career after the 2000-01 season. He played 117 league games and scored 13 goals in his time for Kaiserslautern.

[edit] Managerial career

After ending his active football career, Michael Schjønberg changed into the coaching business when he became youth coach at 1. FC Kaiserslautern in July 2003. He moved to Denmark in July 2004, to coach Danish Superliga club Herfølge BK, alongside good friend Allan Nielsen. Herfølge were relegated to the Danish 1st Division, but Schjønberg kept managing the club. In November 2005, Schjønberg became assistant coach of Hannover 96 manager Peter Neururer. When Neururer was fired in September 2006, Schjønberg took over as head coach in a single DFB-Pokal match, which Hannover won against Dynamo Dresden. When Hannover 96 hired Dieter Hecking as new head coach, he brought Dirk Bremser with him as assistant coach, and Schjønberg became the coach of the second-string team of Hannover 96.

[edit] Honours

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b "Anonym dansker med tysk succes", Politiken, February 10, 1992
  2. ^ "Dansker blev matchvinder i den tyske pokalfinale", Berlingske Tidende, May 25, 1992
  3. ^ Bjarne Nielsen, "700.000 kr for Schjønberg", Ekstra Bladet, April 28, 1994
  4. ^ Torben Larsen, "Schjønberg til Kaiserslautern", B.T., September 3, 1996
  5. ^ (German) Spielstatistik SC Freiburg - 1. FC K'lautern 2:1 (1:1) at FussballDaten

[edit] External links

Denmark Denmark squad - 1998 FIFA World Cup Quarter-finalists Denmark

1 Schmeichel | 2 Schjønberg | 3 Rieper | 4 Høgh | 5 Heintze | 6 Helveg | 7 Nielsen | 8 Frandsen | 9 Molnar | 10 M. Laudrup | 11 B. Laudrup | 12 Colding | 13 Laursen | 14 Wieghorst | 15 Tøfting | 16 Krogh | 17 Goldbæk | 18 Møller | 19 Sand | 20 Henriksen | 21 Jørgensen | 22 Kjær | Coach: Johansson
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