There is hardly a player more coveted throughout Europe than Erling Haaland. On Sunday, BVB boss Hans-Joachim Watzke spoke about the future of the goal scorer.
Hans-Joachim Watzke does not see a club change of Erling Haaland at the end of this season as a foregone conclusion. “It has not yet been decided whether he will actually leave in the summer,” the managing director of Bundesliga soccer club Borussia Dortmund said on Sunday’s “Doppelpass” on Sport1, despite the ongoing reports about an exit clause for the Norwegian worth 75 million euros. Watzke did not want to comment on whether this clause really exists for the coming year: “I’ve never talked about the contents of players’ contracts in my life.”
He added that his statement from 2012 that there would be no more contracts with exit clauses at Dortmund in the future was now outdated: “There are very few sentences in this life that are set in stone for all time. If you’re not a concrete head, you have to realize that the world has changed. I would never say again today, there would never be a BVB player with an exit clause. It’s due to the process of life that you simply redefine yourself after nine years.”
According to Watzke, Haaland “will eventually play for one of the best clubs in the world anyway. But he still has so much time,” he commented. “Robert Lewandowski was with us for four years after his transfer from Lech Poznan before he went to FC Bayern.” In the event of Haaland’s departure, Watzke promised a quick remedy: “One thing our people can count on. We will find one,” Watzke said, referring to BVB’s successful development of talent in recent years.