Barcelona opens door to Boateng: a legend spurned by Munich fans

In Thursday's training, the most eye-catching thing should have been Rashford's absence, but coach Flick welcomed a special visitor-his old subordinate during the two seasons of coaching Bayern Munich, the legendary German central defender Jerome Boateng.

The German international has been without a ball since his contract with the Austrian team LASK ended last season, but has not yet officially announced his retirement. Recently, he was allowed to use the facilities of FC Barcelona Sports City for short-term training to maintain physical condition.

It is believed that this move was largely due to the care of current Barcelona coach Flick. In fact, Boateng originally had the opportunity to return to Bayern as an assistant coach, but ultimately had to give up this opportunity - even though he played for Bayern for more than ten years and played 314 times, helping the team win 9 Bundesliga championships, 2 Champions League trophies, 5 German Cups, 5 German Super Cups, 2 European Super Cups and 2 Club World Cups.

However, despite his outstanding achievements, Boateng has never been able to win the forgiveness of Bayern fans.

The fans were completely disappointed by the off-field turmoil.

Boateng was plagued by off-field scandals in the later stages of his career, and was especially involved in two controversial incidents in his love life. The first incident occurred in 2018, when he had a heated argument with his ex-girlfriend Shailene Senle during a Caribbean holiday, and the latter subsequently accused Boateng of verbal and physical violence against her. Initially, the Munich District Court ordered Boateng to pay 1.8 million euros in compensation; but after a retrial, the court changed it to impose a fine of 200,000 euros, plus a formal warning and a mandatory donation to charity.

An even heavier blow occurred in February 2021: Polish model Kasia Reinhart committed suicide only a week after breaking up with Boateng. This incident caused an uproar, and public opinion strongly condemned Boateng's behavior.

These two incidents completely angered Bayern fans. At the Allianz Arena, fans held up slogans to express their anger: "A clear line must be drawn against violence", "There is no place for evil people in our club, and there is no place for Boateng", "Indulging perpetrators is tantamount to being an accomplice"... Faced with such strong resistance, Bayern finally gave up its plan to invite him to return to the coaching staff.

Now, the former world-class central defender has chosen to temporarily stay at the Barcelona training base to maintain his condition. Perhaps he is also trying to stay away from the shadow of the past and find a new beginning.