Union Berlin: striker Max Kruse – the last guy

It should have been a quiet week for Union Berlin. For the first time, Max Kruse, signed in the summer, made headlines not alongside, but on the pitch: in the 3-1 victory at Hoffenheim, he prepared two goals and scored one.

Just two days later, Kruse returned to the front page, this time for completely different reasons. After the police flashed it, he turned to his followers on Instagram: he posted a photo of the speed camera with the signature “pigs”. Placing a speed camera five meters behind a sign is “already very anti-social,” Kruse said. The “Bild” detailed what Kruse had reacted to by titling “Bild” as “Stupid”.

Such escapades were to be expected. Kruse can afford it, because even at 32 he is one of the strongest players in the Bundesliga. He can demonstrate this slowly in Berlin, although he needs more time to get his bearings in the system of coach Urs Fischer.

Titles next to the square

Anyone who signs Kruse knows who he is taking. In Mönchengladbach he bought a Maserati as a young professional – in camouflage colors. VfL Wolfsburg grunted a five-figure fine after playing poker in Berlin at night – and allegedly forgot € 75,000 in a taxi. Kruse once wrecked his car in Hamburg at four in the morning. Five hours later he was on the training ground in Bremen.

The latest anecdote perhaps best describes the professional Kruse. Off the pitch, he likes to overdo it: when it comes to his job, he is highly professional. Kruse does not miss any training, unlike when she is young, she eats healthy. Friends around him claim that he hasn’t even tried alcohol in his life.

They have already met the two faces of Max Kruse in Berlin. An average kicker would hardly allow a club to get away with inviting complete strangers to a shisha bar on Instagram during a pandemic. However, coach Fischer hosted him a few days later. The Swiss coach has long recognized Kruse’s sporting prowess.

The “floating nine and a half”

Kruse is as unpredictable on the pitch as he is off the pitch. As a teenager, he played football in amateur clubs for a long time, but did not attend a youth center. Kruse does not behave as if he came out of a textbook: again and again he breaks out of the classic pattern, moves a lot across the square and takes liberty. He cannot therefore be defined as a “classic striker”, but he is not a true playmaker either. He was once baptized “swimming nine and a half”. This means: it can be found here and there, anytime, anywhere.

Kruse has not yet allowed himself so much freedom at Union Berlin, at least not on the pitch. He is still looking for his role in the Fischer coach system. So far it has mainly been used as a second striker. As her stormy colleague reaches the summit, Kruse lets himself fall.

In his first missions for the Union, Kruse held back. Now you can see more and more of Kruse’s typical actions at Alte Försterei: how he approaches his teammate on the ball to pull an opposing defender out of defense. As he evades on the left and plays a half-high lob behind the defense. As he looks at the ball and suddenly turns to sprint behind the defense.

Looking for the right role

In Bremen everything revolved around these Kruse moments. Werder manager Florian Kohfeldt had tinkered his entire team in such a way that his teammates would support Kruse optimally. In Berlin, of course, it still takes some time before this cooperation is fruitful. Kruse is not that present yet. In Bremen he was often the player with the most contact with the ball; in Berlin there are still fewer than 50 touches of the ball per game, the defenders and six Robert Andrich are on the ball much more often, Kruse leaves the preparation of the game to his colleagues.

The Union is currently benefiting most from Kruse’s presence in fast movements; for example when Sechser Andrich initiates an attack and picks up speed, while Kruse lures opponents onto him with his evasive moves. The higher the speed of your game, the more Berliners feel at ease.