Bayer Leverkusen’s players and coaching staff had important matters to deal with on the pitch last week, but that didn’t stop them from myself Bringing a visible and bright presence to New York City.
When you have won three different trophies, the Bundesliga, Championship trophyWhy not showcase the German Cups, the DFB Cup and the German Super Cup in just a few hectic months from the spectacular skyline of Manhattan as part of a specially organised trophy tour to attract new fans? The headquarters of the company that owns the club, Bayer, is also located just across the Hudson in New Jersey, so the trip ticked all the boxes.
It was a busy week in the Big Apple for the face of the club throughout the trip. Fernando Carro has been Leverkusen’s CEO since 2018, was born in Barcelona, but has been based in Germany for his entire professional career.
Carro, who describes himself as a sports fanatic, was never a professional footballer but regularly attended matches in the standing section at the top of the Camp Nou, and his mother taught Spanish to, among others, Austrian footballing great Hans Krankl and legendary Bundesliga coach Udo Lattek during her time at the club. Blaugrana.
Carro himself attended a German school in the Catalan capital and completed his studies. high school diploma (prestigious final exams) there. He never imagined what that immersion in a foreign language would ultimately lead to.
“I wanted to be independent from my parents and the studies I did didn’t exist in Spain,” Carro told ESPN last week in New York. “I studied engineering and economics, so I went to Germany and stayed for a long time, actually until today. I worked there for a long time in a media company, so Germany is my second home.”
After speaking to former and current Bayer Leverkusen employees about Carro, each of them has used the words “likable”, “nice” and “passionate” differently. In fact, there is a twinkle in his eye when he speaks and he seems happy with a quote from his business past in which he said he loves people and numbers.
“I always say that football is a people’s business, because we don’t have any factories or production, but we have football players, people who work for the club, so it’s a people’s business and the connection there is important,” he said. “At the same time, you have to work with your own resources.”
When he started out in the football industry six years ago, Carro admits he didn’t just follow the decision-makers in football with their public statements about potential success.
“Bayer 04 has always been at a good level, but we were missing titles, so when I came to Leverkusen I realised that the desire to win titles was important,” he said. “I said that I would rather win the DFB-Pokal than take part in the Champions League.
“As far as numbers are concerned, you should want to be in the Champions League, where you can earn 25-30 million euros. In the Cup, you might only get 5-6 million euros, but you have that trophy. I said we have the potential to fight for the number 1, not every year, but one year to beat Bayern Munich. I said that in my first interview and (then sporting director) Rudi Völler told me: ‘Don’t say it too much, Fernando.'”
His colleagues in the football world have reminded Carro of his manifest ambition.
“They told me: ‘When you started six years ago we didn’t tell you, but we thought you were crazy’, because I said it very openly in meetings with other clubs: I want to be a champion.”
Who’s crazy now?
Leverkusen have received plenty of praise for their stunning 2023-24 season, the first unbeaten campaign by a Bundesliga club in their history and just one point shy of the best points total recorded in a single campaign. Carro is already looking forward to collecting the Ballon d’Or award for Club of the Year, for which Leverkusen have been nominated, on 28 October.
“My impression is that it will be Real Madrid or us, so if we win this, we will get the recognition,” he said. “If Madrid win, we will feel equally rewarded, because our season has been incredible: Europa League finalists, 90 points and unbeaten in the league and winning the Cup. It’s incredible.”
It’s been almost two years since Carro appeared on the weekly Sport 1 TV show “Doppelpass” in front of a live studio audience, and as Leverkusen were going through difficulties under then coach Gerardo Seoane, he was asked about the possibility of a coaching change. Carro famously used the words “We are well prepared” (“we are well prepared”).
No one outside Leverkusen at the time knew that the build-up would lead to the signing of fellow countryman Xabi Alonso, but Carro and highly-respected sporting director Simon Rolfes had crossed paths with the former City midfielder in the preceding months.
“When you say you’re ready, it can mean you need a coach in two years or in a month, and Simon is always preparing a list of coaches and we talk about it openly,” Carro said. “Xabi won’t be here forever, and you have to be ready, and this is something that has to do with professionalism.”
The rest is now German football history, but while most did not necessarily believe that a Bundesliga title was likely until early 2024 with last-minute wins against FC Augsburg and RB Leipzig and then the convincing 3-0 victory over Bayern, Carro was convinced as early as Matchday 2.
“If we play like this every game, no one will be able to beat us,” I thought,” said Carro of his reaction to the 3-0 win over Borussia Monchengladbach in August 2023.
Alonso deserves all the credit for bringing a certain aura to the Rheinland, but Carro believes the adjustment also has to do with Rolfes.
“Simon and Xabi see football in a similar way, wanting to be in control of the game. They were both midfielders who played in the same position,” Carro said. “What convinced me was Xabi’s analytical ability, how he analysed a situation, what he thought was necessary, what he learned from different coaches, so I got the impression that he always wanted to learn. His ability to take his experiences as a player and apply them to his role as a coach. He’s intelligent, calm, ambitious.”
Thanks to 2023-24 Invincible (Invincibles), Leverkusen have plans to organise similar trophy tours in Brazil and perhaps Mexico. Carro sees the club already way ahead of most other Bundesliga rivals in terms of international penetration.
“We are the third club in the Bundesliga with the biggest reach, after Bayern and Borussia Dortmund,” he said. “In Germany, instead of 25,000, we now have 60,000 members. Wherever I go, we have reached another level thanks to last season and I hope we can maintain this.”
Carro has missed just three Bayer 04 games in six years, so crossing the Atlantic again after a whirlwind 48 hours to head straight to the Kraichgau region and watch Leverkusen’s 4-1 win over TSG Hoffenheim was a priority. In the meantime, the club organised a special viewing party for Leverkusen fans old and new at a Brooklyn beer garden.
The Bundesliga will not do what La Liga clubs are considering, potentially bringing league games to the United States. It is simply incongruous in a culture where football is for local communities first and foremost, and everyone connected to the German game knows this.
But Carro offered hope to fans of Leverkusen and other Bundesliga teams in the United States that perhaps the DFL Super Cup, the annual inaugural tournament, could one day be held on American soil.
“In my opinion, and I can’t speak for anyone else, it would be possible to hold the Super Cup in the United States or in another country,” Carro said. “Many fans don’t like it to be the same weekend as the first round of the Cup, so we could do it differently. We have to have new ways of thinking and this can be an example.”
Thinking differently has become one of Carro’s hallmarks in German football and has so far produced unimaginable success.
