Fredi Bobic, together with Giovane Elber and Krassimir Balakov, won the hearts of football fans in Stuttgart and beyond. He reveals to blue Sport who came up with the idea for the legendary trio of strikers.
In the mid-nineties, the German Fredi Bobic, the Bulgarian Krassimir Balakov and the Brazilian Giovane Elber formed the "magic triangle" at VfB Stuttgart - the Swabians' legendary striker trio enchanted the entire Bundesliga.
Both Elber and Balakov have also left their mark in Switzerland. "Giovane came from Grasshoppers. He was a player at AC Milan, but was on loan to GC and then came to VfB. We were the two young players," says Bobic in an interview with blue Sport editor-in-chief Andy Böni, adding: "Krassimir wasn't a player here, but he was a coach at GC and Sankt Gallen."
Elber had already acquired a few Swiss idiosyncrasies in Stuttgart, Bobic reports with a grin: "Whenever he said goodbye, he would say 'Uf Wiederluege'." According to the 53-year-old, who played 37 international matches (10 goals) for the DFB, this special greeting suited Elber because his Brazilian strike partner had also learned the German language incredibly quickly.
Who invented the 'magic triangle' anyway?
"The manager at the time was Dieter Hoeness, he got the three of us," says Bobic. Jürgen Röber also co-initiated it, but he was sacked as coach before Krasimir Balakov came to Stuttgart. "Rolf Fringer and Jogi Löw were then able to really take advantage of it." Rolf Ringer, who now works as an expert for blue Sport, is therefore the (co-)inventor of the magic triangle.
