White and blue dream

Gazprom sponsors Gerhard Schröder's favorite team

Tomorrow, as part of the official visit of Russian President Vladimir Putin to Germany, another major investment of Russian capital in European football will be presented. As German media reported over the weekend, the Gazprom group will become the title sponsor of the German football club Schalke 04 from Gelsenkirchen for the next five years. The Russian monopolist's logo will appear on the team's jerseys. Most likely, the contract will be signed by the German subsidiary ZGG on Gazprom’s part. The value of the contract will exceed 10 million euros per year (in the German championship, only the famous Bayern Munich receives more). Moreover, depending on the team’s sports results in the Bundesliga and European tournaments, the amount of gas injections may increase significantly.

The parties categorically refuse to comment on this information. But they officially admitted that tomorrow Schalke 04 will sign a cooperation agreement with St. Petersburg Zenit, the controlling stake of which is owned by Gazprombank, and the title sponsor is the same Gazprom.

At Gazprom, the change in sponsorship priority (just a couple of months ago the group signed an advertising contract with the Berlin club Hertha) will probably be explained by the charisma of the club from Gelsenkirchen and purely image reasons. For example, the fact that the colors the team wears - blue and white - coincide with the corporate style of the Russian gas concern.

However, Gazprom could have other, more romantic reasons to make Schalke 04 rich. After all, a longtime fan of the Gelsenkirchen team is Vladimir Putin’s personal friend Gerhard Schröder. As you know, a year ago, having barely left the post of Chancellor of Germany, he accepted the invitation of the Russian President and now works as Chairman of the Nord Stream Shareholders Committee for 250 thousand euros a year. This company, which will build a gas pipeline along the bottom of the Baltic Sea from Russia directly to Germany, is 51% owned by Gazprom. And the head of the concern, Alexey Miller, explained the choice of Mr. Schroeder by the need to maintain the image of Russian gas in Europe and ensure the protection of the interests of the project at the highest level. Now the ex-chancellor’s favorite team will do this and will receive generous compensation from Gazprom for this.

“Details of cooperation (Schalke 04 and Zenit. - Ed .) will be presented to the public by the presidents of both sports clubs - Sergei Fursenko and Gerhard Rehberg - next Tuesday in Dresden as part of the Russian-German public forum "St. Petersburg Dialogue" “during the visit of Russian President Vladimir Putin there,” reports the official website of the German team. It also says that the current title sponsor of the club, the insurance company Victoria, unexpectedly made a statement. “The sponsorship agreement between Victoria and Schalke, concluded in mid-2001 and very successfully implemented, is scheduled to expire on June 30, 2007,” it reads. -- Against the background of the expiring agreement between both partners, the possibilities of continuing cooperation in the coming years are currently being discussed. The results of these negotiations should be presented soon. However, it has now been determined that Victoria will continue to be an important and privileged partner of Schalke 04.

It is unknown whether the parties will renegotiate the contract now in order to clear space for Gazprom on the club uniform this season. It is known that insurers paid the club 7.5 million euros per season. That is, Gazprom will raise the bar by at least 25%. On the one hand, the cash increase will not be superfluous in the Schalke 04 budget, but still does not mean a radical increase in its financial well-being. And it certainly does not guarantee positive sports results. Moreover, this year the club has already been eliminated from the UEFA Cup, losing to the French Nancy.

According to Vremya Novostey, the Russian gas workers will not abandon Hertha Berlin, with which ZGG signed a sponsorship agreement at the end of July. Apparently, this agreement, according to which a banner with the slogan Erdgas aus Russland - “natural gas from Russia” - “natural gas from Russia” is placed during matches of the capital team, will be re-registered to the Wingas company (currently Gazprom owns 35% of it, and 65% is owned by German oil and gas company Wintershall, by the end of the year the share of the Russian concern should increase to 50% minus 1 share as part of an asset exchange project).

The concern's ambitious advertising project in Germany will be implemented against the backdrop of a further cooling in relations between the gas concern and the authorities of the European Union. “While members of the group concluded that there was no immediate cause for concern at this time, they agreed that continued vigilance was needed going forward,” the European Commission said in a press release following a meeting of the Gas Coordination Group last week. At the event, on the initiative of the European Commissioner for Energy Andris Piebalgs, issues of reliable gas supply to Europe in winter were discussed. At the same time, Brussels advocates for the need for greater transparency in contractual relations between gas suppliers to Europe, “in order to strengthen confidence in both Russia and Ukraine as reliable partners in gas supplies and transit.” The meeting participants also expressed confidence that major supply problems can be avoided, but difficulties with supply and demand in the coming winter could not be ruled out.

Deputy Chairman of the Board of Gazprom Alexander Medvedev did not accept Mr. Piebalgs’ invitation to take part in this meeting. The company explains this by saying that the invitation was received the day before the meeting and did not fit into the schedule. On the other hand, Gazprom has long relied on direct bilateral agreements with consumer countries, bypassing Brussels. And now he is consistently pursuing this line, the effectiveness of which only time will tell.

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Schalke 04 was founded in 1904 by teenagers - hence the numbers in the name. But the club was officially registered only 5 years later, when one of its founders reached adulthood. The club was originally called Westphalia Schalke, and its colors were not blue and white, but red and yellow. After a series of renamings, the club received its current name in 1928. Historically, it has been established that Adolf Hitler supported this club. Moreover, Schalke 04 made it to its first national Cup final two months after the NSDAP won its first elections in 1933. True, it was not possible to win the trophy that time. The next decade turned out to be a stellar time for the club from Gelsenkirchen, which during this time became the national champion six times, won one Cup and played in the final matches of this tournament nine times. After the war, the club was plagued by failures for a long time. Only in 1958 did Schalke 04 become champions again. Since then, the team from Gelsenkirchen has failed to win a single domestic title, winning the UEFA Cup in 1997.

There are currently no truly star players at the club, even by German standards. Representatives of Schalke 04 did not play for the national team at the last World Cup. However, in recent years he has been consistently fighting for top places in the Bundesliga. In Russia, the club became well known in the early 90s of the last century: from 1989 to 1993, the current senior coach of the Russian national team, Alexander Borodyuk, played for this team. “When I played in Germany, the Germans called me Gorbi,” Alexander Borodyuk told a Vremya Novostei correspondent. “Back then Gorbachev was very popular with them, and all the Russians for whom the Germans had sympathy were named after him.”

Alexey GRIVACHS