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Ehrenfeld is part of Cologne, Germany, renowned for its multicultural community. Senol, working behind the crate at a newsagent near the station, represents exactly that.
About half a century ago, his family uprooted Turkey and came to Germany as a worker after a shortage of manpower. Some 60 miles further down the road to Gelsenkirchen, Mesut Ozil's grandparents did the same thing.
Senol, a former bodyguard, says he enjoys interacting with people and happily joking with his clients. "Are you sure you want the poisonous?" he says ironically to whoever wants a pack of cigarettes.
On the front are the daily newspapers, not only from Germany but also from Turkey. On the front of most of them Monday was a headline on Ozil. From the point of view of Senol and the locals with whom he discusses, it is not the fault of Ozil
Why is this so serious?
A three – part statement from the Arsenal midfielder ended Sunday saying: I no longer play for Germany at the international level while I have this feeling of racism and disrespect. "
World Champion in 2014, he has been crowned 92 times by his country and is currently the most influential German player.
This comes to be of German-Turkish origin, in addition to to have played in Spain and England.Combine his followers on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook and you get a figure of 72 million.
For the German team itself, he had been a regular player Before being eliminated by Sweden for the second match of the World Cup in Russia, he had started every game of a major competition since the 2010 World Cup, his debut on the competitive world stage.
The controversy around him goes back to May, a day before the announcement of the World Cup team of Germany's Ozil, with the Manchester City midfielder. Ilkay Gundogan, photographed with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan
seen in Germany, with Erdogan approaching another election and seen by many in the country like a dictator. It was only in February that German journalist Deniz Yucel was released after being detained for a year, accused of propaganda.
"The two [Ozil and Gundogan] made a mistake, but we must also keep this in perspective" FA President Reinhard Grindel before the World Cup
When Ozil did not show up at the National team media day, he added: "If he does not want to answer interviews, then maybe he will do it"
The manager of the team team, Oliver Bierhoff, said before the tournament that the problem had been settled, but the crowd's whistles in the last warm-up match of Germany in Leverkusen have suggested the opposite. years, with Ozil – among others – prisoner by politicians of the far right of the country, eager to make political capital after a failure of football
The reaction in Germany
After the release of 39 Germany, the role of Gundogan largely out of the firing but German striker Grindel and former German striker Bierhoff aimed Ozil
"To date, with the team German, we never forced something [with players] always trying to convince them instead.With Mesut, this did not happen and in this sense you have to consider if we could have done without him in a sporting sense, "said Bierhoff in an interview with the newspaper Die Welt
Grindel, meanwhile, said Ozil should
By making the argument a binary, and choosing Ozil in the process, their criticism saw them fall on the same side of the argument that those who have Ozil's echoed from the far right of the country.
] This does not include Bayern President Uli Hoeness, but he still testified at Ozil on Monday, calling it a "bad excuse for the footballer" who "had not made any tack since the 2014 World Cup".
of the national tabloid Bild, with a commentary titled "Enough is enough"
Yet while a few have criticized Ozil for pouring only oil on the In the debate, there was more sympathy for the 29-year-old. the wake of his statements and stronger criticism of the DFB
Last week, the Hoeness cohort, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, president of Bayern, defended Ozil and called the "amateurs" of the DFB. The badociation's former press officer, Harald Stenger, has since described Grindel as "the worst president of the FA over the last 50 years"
Beyond football
Back in Ehrenfeld, Senol thinks everything was disproportionate
"The guy is not He should have done the same thing and why not, he is our president, it would be the same if Angela Merkel did it too. "
Senol says he does not support Erdogan but there is Ozil's naivety certainly said that, there could be an impact for the DFB at a lower level, as Peter Ahrens pointed out from the German magazine Der Spiegel earlier this month
. who will also register players from migrant families with academics: does the DFB play for Germany? Future talented players will probably choose Germany without hesitation, after the experience of the Ozil case.
Ozil is by no means the only player in the recent history of Germany with a second nationality. Miroslav Klose and Lukas Podolski have Polish roots, Sami Khedira is Tunisian and Jerome Boateng is of Ghanaian origin.
Boateng was verbally attacked by a right-wing politician at the last World Cup. He did not want the Bayern Munich defender to be his neighbor, which was stifled by the reactions of the player and the public
Ozil's problem, meanwhile, has just been prolonged.
What happens next?
In a statement released on Monday, the DFB congratulated Ozil for "shaping a successful era on and off the field", before defending his own work on integration and rejecting accusations of racism. Ozil
. The words "Reinhard Grindel" are not found in their response of 472 words. He's on vacation. There are already calls from politicians and fans for him to resign immediately.
If Ozil has to play again for Germany, that would probably be the first step towards that.
As long as Bierhoff remains a team leader, and even Joachim Low as a coach, it's hard to see his international career continue.
In Senol's words: "It's a pity, he's a good guy, he's a good footballer and now he's lost a good footballer."
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