In this exclusive extract from his book 'All Or Nothing; A season in the life of the Champions League', Andy Brassell meets Paul Lambert, the first British player to win the Champions League.
"It (his arrival) was off the back of (Germany's win at) Euro 96. (Their) plane was mobbed by Dortmund fans. I started to wonder 'What am I doing here?'" Not that the size of the club itself had been any particular shock to Lambert. "I knew it was a massive club because Motherwell had played them in the UEFA Cup." If he was under any doubts at the size of the task facing him over the next few days, it was put into sharp focus when he got on the team bus. "There was Stefan Reuter, Stefan Klos, Lars Ricken, Jörg Heinrich, Andy Möller, Jurgen Köhler, (and) back in Dortmund Paolo Sousa (freshly-signed '96 Champions League winner) and Karl-Heinz Riedle." They also had Matthias Sammer, rated by many as the best player at Euro 96, and who would go on to win the European Footballer of the Year trophy in 1997. Still, it could have been harder. "Stefan Freund hurt his knee in Euro 96 so I got to play in the centre," Lambert remembers of the start of the trial period.
However, Lambert thought his big chance was over before it had really begun. In the pre-season Fuji Cup (played between Germany's top four clubs) he played in the opener against local rivals Schalke before being injured after only 25 minutes in the following match against Borussia Mönchengladbach. "I thought 'That's it, I've blown it.' Then on the Friday before they played Leverkusen in the first Bundesliga game of the season they said 'the contract's ready, just go and sign it." Lambert had just turned 27. The real work had only just begun.
"You had to (improve)," he agrees, "otherwise you wouldn't have got a game, I don't think. You were playing with some guys who'd won the World Cup, as well as Serie A, the Bundesliga, they'd won everything in sight." He raises his eyebrows in still-intact incredulity. "And I'm coming from Motherwell, so you just think 'hold your own'." Nevertheless, he wasn't expected to fill a greater role than that of squad player. "To be fair, I played in the Leverkusen game, the first game, and we got beat 4-2. Ottmar (Hitzfeld, BVB coach) said to me - and I scored in the game funnily enough - 'listen, you've done well, but we've bought Paolo Sousa from Juventus for about £7 million. If he's fit, if his knee's ok, then he's going to play,' which was fine. I never expected to play in the first place. We played Düsseldorf on the Tuesday and Paolo's knee didn't stand up to the fitness test. I played in that, won 4-0, and it just snowballed." The transition from supporting actor to leading role was necessarily swift. "You were constantly in the side, and then you were looked upon as one of them." Lambert's performances dismissed any ideas he would be out his depth, but he had never been required to pass any 'test' by the established stars in the first place. "Even when (I was) on trial, every one of them came and said 'good luck, hope you get your contract.' Never any jealousy or anything like that."
Being thrust into the thick of it also meant being catapulted virtually straight away into the Champions League as well, with the campaign starting in the second week of September. BVB had no real history to speak of in the competition - their best achievements in Europe had been winning the 1966 Cup Winners' Cup, beating Liverpool in the final, and more recently a UEFA Cup final defeat to Juventus in 1993. Expectation had been raised considerably, however, by successive Bundesliga titles and reaching the Champions League quarter-finals the previous year, to be defeated by holders and eventual runners-up Ajax. The team negotiated the group stage without too many scares, in a group overwhelmingly dominated by the Germans and Atlético Madrid. After that they made surprisingly short work of reaching the final in defeating first Auxerre and then Manchester United, beating both teams in both the home and away legs. For a British player, beating United usually feels like a cast-iron promise of success to come, but Lambert was already quietly confident.
Having had to adapt to such a high level, he knew the calibre of what was around him. "I had the feeling we would win either the league (they eventually finished third) or the Champions League, looking round the dressing room at the other players," he nods. "I thought it's going to take something to beat us. As soon as we beat Auxerre away, I just felt in myself, we've got a really good chance of winning this." The semi-final dispatch of Manchester United was so (relatively) comfortable after Lars Ricken's early goal in the second leg at Old Trafford gave BVB an overall two-goal lead, that it's almost just a footnote in the struggle for the trophy.
The final was, however, a different kettle of fish entirely. Juventus weren't just the holders, and the team that had snuffed out BVB's best previous effort to capture a European trophy, but they were one of the most successful clubs in Europe having just won the Italian title for the 25th time in the club's history. Then there was the team itself. Lambert raises the eyebrows and exhales again. "Look at their team. Jesus. Peruzzi, Montero, Deschamps, Jugovic, Boksic, Vieri, Del Piero comes off the bench, Di Livio. It was an incredible team." Nor were they particularly shy about the fact. "When were walking out the tunnel, Di Livio had the score on his hand - 3-1. Big black writing on his hand, and I looked over for some reason." Given the irony of this in retrospect, it's no wonder that this is one of the moments that sticks in Lambert's mind.
You could focus on the incident as something that would channel the mind in a moment of high tension, but although Lambert admits to a few nerves - "Stefan Klos is sitting one side and I'm sitting on the other side. I can just see his knee going up and down." - the mood amongst the squad was as normal as could be expected. The Scot seems to have drawn his own confidence from the poise and the professionalism of those around him. "On the bus, nobody speaks. To be fair, it was always like that on a match day, no one really speaking. It was a big, big game and they were big, big players who'd been through it all before."
Even though playing in their own country (in Munich's Olympiastadion) the Germans were still highly unfancied. There is, however, nothing to make a final go with a swing like the underdogs getting the first goal. Lambert set it up - "a diagonal ball to the back post, like the coach had been talking about before the game", which Riedle controlled and finished in style. "Getting the first goal was vital for us," Lambert agrees. This was just before the half-hour, and five minutes later the lead was doubled when Riedle sent a trademark bullet header into the top corner from Möller's corner.
Juve seemed affronted by BVB's cheek in defying them, something never more apparent than in their extended protests at the Hungarian referee Puhl's (correct) decision to rule out a Vieri effort late in the first half for handball. I mention to Lambert that I saw a re-run of the game on Eurosport a few months back. The co-commentator, ex-Northern Ireland manager Bryan Hamilton, seemed to share their offence, constantly complaining that "Juventus shouldn't be losing" throughout. Lambert is unsurprised. "That to me sums up the British Isles mentality. They don't know the Germans, their footballers, they don't what it's like working with them." You can sense his irritation at the way German teams are derided for their efficiency, their achievements belittled as the work of mere spoilers. For the record, BVB scored exactly the same amount of goals on the road to the final (20) as the Juventus of Vieri, Zidane, Boksic and company.
The Italians did eventually pull a goal back twenty minutes into the second half. It was a goal justifying the pre-final hype, Boksic's low left-wing cross being imperiously guided home by the substitute Del Piero's back-heel. Paul Lambert's football life flashed before his eyes. "When Del Piero scores - you think 'f**k'. You look at the clock and just say 'please', because you know this is the biggest tournament you're ever gonna be involved in." He need not have worried. Just six minutes later Dortmund's own sub, the 20-year-old Ricken, ran onto a through pass before sending an outrageous chip over Peruzzi from 25 yards. It's amazing to watch a replay of the goal. The ball seems to hang in the air for an eternity before dropping in. God knows what it must have felt like watching it on the same pitch.
It was the most emphatic of denouements. "When we went back to the centre (after the goal) I just knew in their faces they weren't going to come back. That's when I knew that we'd got it." It's still the moment Lambert recalls most vividly from the game itself. Less than half an hour later Jurgen Köhler was lifting the trophy to proclaim Borussia Dortmund as champions of Europe.
By Andy Brassell
"It (his arrival) was off the back of (Germany's win at) Euro 96. (Their) plane was mobbed by Dortmund fans. I started to wonder 'What am I doing here?'" Not that the size of the club itself had been any particular shock to Lambert. "I knew it was a massive club because Motherwell had played them in the UEFA Cup." If he was under any doubts at the size of the task facing him over the next few days, it was put into sharp focus when he got on the team bus. "There was Stefan Reuter, Stefan Klos, Lars Ricken, Jörg Heinrich, Andy Möller, Jurgen Köhler, (and) back in Dortmund Paolo Sousa (freshly-signed '96 Champions League winner) and Karl-Heinz Riedle." They also had Matthias Sammer, rated by many as the best player at Euro 96, and who would go on to win the European Footballer of the Year trophy in 1997. Still, it could have been harder. "Stefan Freund hurt his knee in Euro 96 so I got to play in the centre," Lambert remembers of the start of the trial period.
However, Lambert thought his big chance was over before it had really begun. In the pre-season Fuji Cup (played between Germany's top four clubs) he played in the opener against local rivals Schalke before being injured after only 25 minutes in the following match against Borussia Mönchengladbach. "I thought 'That's it, I've blown it.' Then on the Friday before they played Leverkusen in the first Bundesliga game of the season they said 'the contract's ready, just go and sign it." Lambert had just turned 27. The real work had only just begun.
"You had to (improve)," he agrees, "otherwise you wouldn't have got a game, I don't think. You were playing with some guys who'd won the World Cup, as well as Serie A, the Bundesliga, they'd won everything in sight." He raises his eyebrows in still-intact incredulity. "And I'm coming from Motherwell, so you just think 'hold your own'." Nevertheless, he wasn't expected to fill a greater role than that of squad player. "To be fair, I played in the Leverkusen game, the first game, and we got beat 4-2. Ottmar (Hitzfeld, BVB coach) said to me - and I scored in the game funnily enough - 'listen, you've done well, but we've bought Paolo Sousa from Juventus for about £7 million. If he's fit, if his knee's ok, then he's going to play,' which was fine. I never expected to play in the first place. We played Düsseldorf on the Tuesday and Paolo's knee didn't stand up to the fitness test. I played in that, won 4-0, and it just snowballed." The transition from supporting actor to leading role was necessarily swift. "You were constantly in the side, and then you were looked upon as one of them." Lambert's performances dismissed any ideas he would be out his depth, but he had never been required to pass any 'test' by the established stars in the first place. "Even when (I was) on trial, every one of them came and said 'good luck, hope you get your contract.' Never any jealousy or anything like that."
Being thrust into the thick of it also meant being catapulted virtually straight away into the Champions League as well, with the campaign starting in the second week of September. BVB had no real history to speak of in the competition - their best achievements in Europe had been winning the 1966 Cup Winners' Cup, beating Liverpool in the final, and more recently a UEFA Cup final defeat to Juventus in 1993. Expectation had been raised considerably, however, by successive Bundesliga titles and reaching the Champions League quarter-finals the previous year, to be defeated by holders and eventual runners-up Ajax. The team negotiated the group stage without too many scares, in a group overwhelmingly dominated by the Germans and Atlético Madrid. After that they made surprisingly short work of reaching the final in defeating first Auxerre and then Manchester United, beating both teams in both the home and away legs. For a British player, beating United usually feels like a cast-iron promise of success to come, but Lambert was already quietly confident.
Having had to adapt to such a high level, he knew the calibre of what was around him. "I had the feeling we would win either the league (they eventually finished third) or the Champions League, looking round the dressing room at the other players," he nods. "I thought it's going to take something to beat us. As soon as we beat Auxerre away, I just felt in myself, we've got a really good chance of winning this." The semi-final dispatch of Manchester United was so (relatively) comfortable after Lars Ricken's early goal in the second leg at Old Trafford gave BVB an overall two-goal lead, that it's almost just a footnote in the struggle for the trophy.
The final was, however, a different kettle of fish entirely. Juventus weren't just the holders, and the team that had snuffed out BVB's best previous effort to capture a European trophy, but they were one of the most successful clubs in Europe having just won the Italian title for the 25th time in the club's history. Then there was the team itself. Lambert raises the eyebrows and exhales again. "Look at their team. Jesus. Peruzzi, Montero, Deschamps, Jugovic, Boksic, Vieri, Del Piero comes off the bench, Di Livio. It was an incredible team." Nor were they particularly shy about the fact. "When were walking out the tunnel, Di Livio had the score on his hand - 3-1. Big black writing on his hand, and I looked over for some reason." Given the irony of this in retrospect, it's no wonder that this is one of the moments that sticks in Lambert's mind.
You could focus on the incident as something that would channel the mind in a moment of high tension, but although Lambert admits to a few nerves - "Stefan Klos is sitting one side and I'm sitting on the other side. I can just see his knee going up and down." - the mood amongst the squad was as normal as could be expected. The Scot seems to have drawn his own confidence from the poise and the professionalism of those around him. "On the bus, nobody speaks. To be fair, it was always like that on a match day, no one really speaking. It was a big, big game and they were big, big players who'd been through it all before."
Even though playing in their own country (in Munich's Olympiastadion) the Germans were still highly unfancied. There is, however, nothing to make a final go with a swing like the underdogs getting the first goal. Lambert set it up - "a diagonal ball to the back post, like the coach had been talking about before the game", which Riedle controlled and finished in style. "Getting the first goal was vital for us," Lambert agrees. This was just before the half-hour, and five minutes later the lead was doubled when Riedle sent a trademark bullet header into the top corner from Möller's corner.
Juve seemed affronted by BVB's cheek in defying them, something never more apparent than in their extended protests at the Hungarian referee Puhl's (correct) decision to rule out a Vieri effort late in the first half for handball. I mention to Lambert that I saw a re-run of the game on Eurosport a few months back. The co-commentator, ex-Northern Ireland manager Bryan Hamilton, seemed to share their offence, constantly complaining that "Juventus shouldn't be losing" throughout. Lambert is unsurprised. "That to me sums up the British Isles mentality. They don't know the Germans, their footballers, they don't what it's like working with them." You can sense his irritation at the way German teams are derided for their efficiency, their achievements belittled as the work of mere spoilers. For the record, BVB scored exactly the same amount of goals on the road to the final (20) as the Juventus of Vieri, Zidane, Boksic and company.
The Italians did eventually pull a goal back twenty minutes into the second half. It was a goal justifying the pre-final hype, Boksic's low left-wing cross being imperiously guided home by the substitute Del Piero's back-heel. Paul Lambert's football life flashed before his eyes. "When Del Piero scores - you think 'f**k'. You look at the clock and just say 'please', because you know this is the biggest tournament you're ever gonna be involved in." He need not have worried. Just six minutes later Dortmund's own sub, the 20-year-old Ricken, ran onto a through pass before sending an outrageous chip over Peruzzi from 25 yards. It's amazing to watch a replay of the goal. The ball seems to hang in the air for an eternity before dropping in. God knows what it must have felt like watching it on the same pitch.
It was the most emphatic of denouements. "When we went back to the centre (after the goal) I just knew in their faces they weren't going to come back. That's when I knew that we'd got it." It's still the moment Lambert recalls most vividly from the game itself. Less than half an hour later Jurgen Köhler was lifting the trophy to proclaim Borussia Dortmund as champions of Europe.
By Andy Brassell
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