Founded: 1933 (as Austria Salzburg)
Home ground: Red Bull Arena
Location: Wals-Siezenheim, Salzburg
Colours: Red/White
Manager: Matthias Jaissle
Website: www.redbullsalzburg.at
The history:
Austria Salzburg, founded in 1933, were arguably the most successful club in Austrian football in the 1990s, winning three Bundesliga titles and reaching the UEFA Cup final. But the tide soon began to turn and with the Violets underperforming in the league and struggling with their finances, energy drinks manufacturer Red Bull stepped in in April 2005 and took over the club. Renamed Red Bull Salzburg, they have since established themselves as the dominant force in Austria and have been almost untouchable in recent years, winning each of the last eight league titles and earning plaudits for their achievements on the European stage.
The early days
Austria Salzburg won the Salzburger Landespokal in 1937 and 1959, but it was not until the 1970s that the Violets started to compete for national trophies. The club finished as league runners-up in 1971 – the same year their legendary Stadion Lehen was inaugurated – and reached the cup final three years later. However, the real golden era came in the mid-1990s when they claimed three titles in four years and became only the third Austrian club to reach a European final, losing the 1994 UEFA Cup showpiece to Italian giants Inter Milan.
After the turn of the millennium, however, financial issues began to come to the fore and Austria Salzburg increasingly fell off the pace in the league. By the time the 2004/05 season – in which they finished in ninth place and flirted with relegation – came to a close, a deal had been struck for the club to be purchased by Red Bull. The move prompted the Austria Salzburg fans to found an eponymous phoenix club, which started life in the seventh tier. Red Bull Salzburg, meanwhile, became title challengers overnight.
Red Bull gives you wins
With Adidas and Audi now on board as sponsors and Giovanni Trapattoni teaming up with Lothar Matthäus in the dugout, a new-look Salzburg side including German veterans Alexander Zickler and Thomas Linke won the Bundesliga title in their second season under the new ownership, finishing 19 points clear of Ried.
But there were some bumps in the road, notably the following year when they sustained their biggest-ever defeat: a 7-0 home hammering at the hands of Rapid Vienna, who beat them to the Bundesliga title by six points. A trio of Dutch coaches – Co Adriaanse, Huub Stevens and Ricardo Moniz – all served spells in the dugout over the following four years as the Red Bulls added three more league titles and claimed their first ÖFB-Cup success thanks to a dominant 3-0 victory over Ried in the 2012 final.
Enter Ralf Rangnick
Although the years that followed the takeover were undoubtedly successful, the real turning point came when Ralf Rangnick was appointed as sporting director in 2012. The German immediately set about making changes to the psychological and nutrition departments, transforming the playing style into the fast-paced, high-pressing game with which Salzburg have since become synonymous, and putting more of an emphasis on youth in a bid to bring down the average age of the squad (almost 30 at the time).
With a scouting network in place that stretched across Europe and beyond, the likes of Sadio Mané, Kevin Kampl and Peter Gulácsi were all brought in – young players who could make an immediate impact and would later achieve a high sell-on fee – as part of Rangnick’s squad overhaul. The focus on youth swiftly paid dividends: within five years, Salzburg had become the first and to date only Austrian club to lift the UEFA Youth League – the U19 equivalent of the Champions League – thanks to a 2-1 win over Benfica in the final.
Unparalleled dominance
Rangnick’s first season in the role saw Salzburg miss out on the Bundesliga crown to Austria Vienna, but they have not looked back since. The Red Bulls have won every league title in the intervening eight years, smashing the previous record of four consecutive titles set by Austria Vienna in the late 70s and early 80s, and putting together the third-longest ongoing title-winning streak in European football – behind Ludogorets of Bulgaria (10) and Bayern Munich of Germany (9).
Their dominance has also carried over into the ÖFB-Cup, which Salzburg have won in seven of the last eight seasons and only missed out on in 2018 following an extra-time defeat to Sturm Graz. Coaches have come and gone – Marco Rose and Jesse Marsch left for Borussia Mönchengladbach and RB Leipzig respectively, before the current coach Matthias Jaissle was appointed – but the success has continued: Salzburg’s record of seven doubles in the last eight seasons is not matched by any other club on the continent.
European adventures
Though an all-conquering force domestically, Salzburg struggled for years to reach the UEFA Champions League. In one of European football’s longest-running curses, the Red Bulls went through 11 unsuccessful qualifying attempts before a change to Austria’s UEFA coefficient saw them qualify automatically for the 2019/20 edition. Eliminated from the group stages in the first two campaigns, the Red Bulls made history this season by becoming only the second Austrian club to progress through the group phase of Europe’s premier club competition, setting up a mouth-watering last-16 tie with 2020 champions Bayern Munich.
While this is uncharted territory at the very highest level, Salzburg do have experience of European knockout football over the last decade. In fact, they have been one of the most frequently represented clubs in the Europa League since it was rebranded in 2009/10, and put together an incredible run in the competition in 2017/18 as they reached the semi-finals before being eliminated by Marseille. Now, the task for Jaissle’s young guns will be to replicate that on the biggest stage of all – a daunting prospect, but one they will surely relish.
The stadium:
In December 2002, it was announced that Austria had won the bid to co-host the 2008 UEFA European Championship with Switzerland and that Salzburg – along with Vienna, Innsbruck and Klagenfurt – would be a host venue. With the construction of a new stadium already under way in the city at the time of the announcement, ‘EM-Stadion Wals-Siezenheim’ was completed by spring 2003 and inaugurated with a league game between Austria Salzburg and FC Kärnten on 8 March. With the tournament in mind, further renovations were conducted in the years that followed and the stadium capacity was increased from 18,250 to 30,188.
Renamed the ‘Red Bull Arena’ following the 2005 takeover, the home of Red Bull Salzburg has since undergone a number of additional modifications: the artificial turf was replaced by natural grass in 2010, while the stadium façade was given its modern-day Nordic look in 2012. One of the largest stadia in Austria, it cost around €70 million to build – including €25 million for the EURO 2008 adaptations.
The team:
Eyebrows were raised in some quarters when it was announced last spring that outgoing coach Jesse Marsch would be replaced by Matthias Jaissle, a 33-year-old whose only previous experience as a senior head coach had come in a short stint with Salzburg’s feeder club Liefering. Having been placed in charge in January 2021, he came within a whisker of guiding the youngsters to the second-tier title – only missing out to eventual winners Blau-Weiss Linz by one goal – and was swiftly earmarked for promotion.
Jaissle quickly set about winning over the doubters, becoming the first-ever Salzburg coach to win his first 10 Austrian Bundesliga matches and bringing more balance to a previously top-heavy side. He has undoubtedly been aided by his pre-existing relationships with the likes of Luka Sucic, Nicolas Seiwald, Benjamin Sesko, Junior Adamu and Karim Adeyemi, who all worked under him at Liefering last term.
Adeyemi, who is the Bundesliga’s top scorer with 14 goals from 17 appearances, has had a breakout season for the Red Bulls, becoming the first Austrian Bundesliga player to represent Germany at senior level and receive the Golden Boy award given out by Italian sports newspaper Tuttosport. Though the star man, he is surrounded by top-quality team-mates – including the likes of US attacker Brenden Aaronson, Austrian midfielder Nicolas Seiwald and marauding Danish right-back Rasmus Kristensen.
Vocabulary
the tide turned |
das Blatt hat sich gewendet |
underperform |
schlecht abschneiden |
inaugurate |
einweihen |
eponymous |
gleichnamig |
phoenix club |
Nachfolgeverein |
synonymous |
gleichbedeutend |
unparalleled |
unvergleichlich |
curse |
Fluch |
mouth-watering |
schmackhaft |
uncharted territory |
unbekanntes Terrain |
daunting |
|
relish |
reizvoll finden |
raise eyebrows |
für Stirnrunzeln sorgen |
earmarked |
gekennzeichnet |
top-heavy |
angriffsorientiert |
Die Kollegen von "The Other Bundesliga" porträtieren in regelmäßigen Abständen die Klubs der Liga - auf Englisch mit der dazugehörigen Vokabelauswahl. In dieser Serie sind bisher folgende Klubporträts entstanden:SK Austria Klagenfurt, SK Rapid Wien, SK Sturm Graz, LASK, FK Austria Wien, RZ Pellets WAC, WSG Tirol , SV Guntamatic Ried, FC Flyeralarm Admira TSV Hartberg