Lena Wurzenberger, the girlfriend of Julian Nagelsmann, is reportedly quitting her job as a reporter for the Bild newspaper at the end of the month because it has created a “lack of trust” in the Bayern Munich locker room.
After 15 years of marriage, Nagelsmann and his wife Verena divorced last summer, and it was later discovered that he was seeing Lena Wurzenberger.
Nagelsmann and Verena have been married since 2018, and they have a son and a daughter.
Due to her friendship with the management, Lena was immediately asked to stop covering Bayern Munich. Now, the Deutsche Presse-Agentur has reported that Wurzenberger is quitting the newspaper and that her lover has been fired by the German champions.
Axel Springer Verlag, the publisher, said in a statement to DPA: ‘We have complied with [her request to leave] and wish her every success in the future.’
Notwithstanding Wurzenberger’s removal from the coverage of Bayern Munich by BILD last year, it has been noted that she was a significant factor in the players’ lack of confidence in Nagelsmann in the locker room.
‘I know that Nagelsmann’s relationship with a BILD reporter was a huge topic in the dressing room,’ former Bayern and Liverpool star Markus Babbel told Blick.
‘It didn’t go down well at all that he was with her. His girlfriend was therefore a big problem for Bayern.’
He also added that: ‘There was a lack of trust because some players just weren’t able to communicate what they were thinking anymore. Because they were afraid that everything would end up in the newspaper.’
Fear of dressing room secrets increased earlier this month after tactical plans were published in Bild.
Although there is no proof that Wurzenberger was behind the leaks, the tactical plans’ publication in Bild did little to lessen the suspicion surrounding their working relationship.
According to documents that were leaked and appeared on the German website Bild, the Bundesliga team changed their method.
These were given to players to emphasize their tactical requirements and a certain course of action.
‘It bothers me a lot. The person who transmits this harms each of the players, he is not the objective,’ Nagelsmann lashed out.
Before relocating to Munich, Wurzenberger covered Werder Bremen. There, she covered the Bundesliga champions for the previous two years until becoming addicted to the team last year.
The Bayern manager received word of his impending dismissal on Thursday night while on a skiing trip with his 30-year-old girlfriend in the Austrian Zillertal during the international break.
Lena Wurzenberger
Nagelsmann’s partner, Lena Wurzenberger, was a Bundesliga reporter for Werder Bremen in the past.
But after that, she relocated to Munich and spent the following two years closely monitoring the German champions.
The 30-year-old conducted an interview with Sadio Mane for Bild after he transferred from Liverpool to Bayern Munich in the summer of 2016.
Why Was Julian Nagelsmann Dismissed?
The 35-year-old German leaves with his team one point behind league leaders Borussia Dortmund after guiding Bayern to the Bundesliga title in his debut season in charge.
After keeping good form in seven of their eight European games, they are also in the quarterfinals of the Champions League, where they will play Manchester City.
The club’s board was unhappy with Nagelsmann despite the fact that he only suffered three league losses all season and averaged 2.19 points per game throughout his 19 months in charge, which is the fourth-best total in Bundesliga history for a Bayern manager.
Bayern’s managers are worried about the team’s lack of development, the struggles of highly paid players like Sadio Mane and Leroy Sane this season, and Nagelsmann’s propensity to rile up important players in the dressing room.
He and Manuel Neuer never got along, and their disagreement became apparent after the captain fractured his leg while skiing in December and had to watch his best friend and goalkeeping coach Toni Tapalovic get fired.
The way Nagelsmann conducted himself during practices and how he incessantly shouted instructions from the sidelines during games was frequently criticized by other players as well. A sizable section of the team felt that their coach came across as an arrogant know-it-all.
The coach, who is unquestionably talented, ultimately had no one at the highest level to defend him.
