mtu-Cup

Dear Fans,

On behalf of the football section of VfB Friedrichshafen, it's our pleasure to welcome you to the 18th edition of the mtu-Cup.

After 2 years of Covid-enforced abstinence, the very best of Europe's U15 football teams will again be pitting their strength against highly motivated youth squads from in and around Friedrichshafen. And these exciting encounters, sorely missed by young fans for two years running now, are taking place in a new venue - Hall A1 of the Friedrichshafen Exhibition Center.

First and foremost, we'd like to thank the City of Friedrichshafen and its Mayor, Andreas Brand, without whose indefatigable efforts a tournament of this magnitude in an exhibition hall lacking the necessary logistics would simply not have been feasible. Our warmest thanks also to the Friedrichshafen Exhibition Center, who, as you see, have succeeded in transforming the trade exhibition space into a veritable cathedral of football.

After many months of effort, tournament manager Klaus Segelbacher has succeeded this year again in bringing the crème de la crème of European football to Lake Constance –  so hats off to him for a great achievement.

To make all this possible, we also depend on the generous support of our sponsors. We'd particularly like to mention Rolls-Royce and its product brand mtu and give an extra warm welcome to the many mtu employees in attendance. The names of the other sponsors are shown in the tournament booklet and of course in the various promotional activities in and around the exhibition hall. When you're making future purchases, our advertising partners would much appreciate your patronage.

A big thank-you as well to our many volunteers whose untiring efforts prior to and during this event ensure a smoothly-running tournament for you, dear spectators, to enjoy. Most of the time they're invisible, but for us, our volunteers are absolutely essential to the philosophy of our club.

All that's left for me now is to wish you an exciting football tournament played in a true spirit of sportsmanship. Applaud our young footballers loudly when they demonstrate their artistry in successful sequences and actions!

We wish all players sporting success and unforgettable footballing moments in Friedrichshafen.

Sportingly yours,

Andreas Müller-Hirlinger | Klaus Segelbacher | Dragan Novakovic

Dear Football Fans,

We've all been sadly missing tournaments like the mtu-Cup over the past couple of years. Indoor football competitions like these are an invaluable experience for children and young adults – providing a brief but wonderful opportunity for them to simply do what they enjoy most – play a series of fast, intense games, pitting their skills against the competition. Indeed, national team players often reminisce openly about the tournaments of their childhood and how much they gained from those action-packed days of football.

Many of them also played in the mtu-Cup in Friedrichshafen, putting to good use the potential of a first-class event with a great atmosphere that's made a name for itself not just in Germany but throughout Europe and across the globe. Take a look at the tournament's hall of fame and see just how many upcoming football stars have played in the mtu-Cup: Thomas Müller, Joshua Kimmich, Jamal Musiala, Marc-André ter Stegen, Serge Gnabry, Timo Werner, Niklas Süle and Marco Reus, amongst many others. They all came to Lake Constance and have very positive memories of the meeting. I'm very pleased that the excellent work put in by the VfB Friedrichshafen is being seen by the DFB, who awarded your club the Sepp Herberger prize in 2020. Let me add that this is an accolade you have truly earned.

My sincere thanks go to the organizers and everyone involved in realizing this tournament. You've shown incredible commitment, putting your energies and considerable expertise into providing ideal conditions for others to play football. In doing so, you've made a valuable contribution to social cohesion in Germany and for this you deserve our recognition and support. I greatly respect your dedication and promise that we shall be lobbying our law-makers to improve the conditions for volunteer work in Germany. The City of Friedrichshafen is likewise to be commended for its commitment. Closure of the ZF-Arena might have meant the end of the mtu-Cup if the City had not come to the rescue and taken on the costs and rental of the exhibition hall. So my deepest thanks to them as well. 

The mtu-Cup is a kind of junior European championship for club teams.  Almost all of the teams at the top of the Bundesliga will be competing, along with the junior squads of a number of leading European clubs such as Manchester United, FC Barcelona and Ajax Amsterdam. Dear organizers and hosts – what you put together year after year is truly impressive!

This tournament is also a small-scale version of the major event Germany is preparing for in 2024. In just under two years, Germany and the DFB will be hosting the UEFA European Championship for the second time. But now, we want to be even more than perfect hosts and organizers of a carefree festival of football. Our declared aim for this European Championship is for it to specially benefit our football base as well – some 24,000 clubs across the country who act on a smaller scale, but with a huge impact –  just like VfB Friedrichshafen.

Which leaves me now to wish everyone involved lots of fun and every success in this long-awaited comeback of the mtu-Cup.

Sincerely,
Bern Neuendorf

Dear Fans, Players, and Guests,

The mtu-Cup is finally back – a unique football event sorely missed in the last two years by football fans in Friedrichshafen and the surrounding region. Added to that, the event's traditional venue in the ZF-Arena was no longer available.

So I'm truly delighted that together, we managed to find a new location in the form of the Friedrichshafen Exhibition Center. It was very important to me and the local council that the mtu-Cup tournament organized by VfB Friedrichshafen for young players from European teams continue to take place. Now all of us, spectators and players alike, can again look forward to cheering the teams along in thrilling football games full of nail-biting moments. After such a long interval, I'm sure that players and fans alike will be fired up more than ever, with a great atmosphere to be savored on the benches and in the crowd.

Football, it is said, is the most beautiful pastime in the world. It connects people, and encourages their team spirit and solidarity. Winning, losing, falling over, getting up again – those are experiences important for us, as members of society, to have.

The mtu-Cup would be inconceivable without its many helping hands. I'd like to extend my warmest thanks to all volunteers in the VfB football family, as well as the many sponsors of the mtu-Cup. They are the ones who make an unforgettable football experience possible in the first place for the fans.

I hope all the teams enjoy successes on the field, and that interested visitors from near and far will get to enjoy top-class football, a host of goals, and good entertainment during a weekend in Friedrichshafen that will live long in our memories.

Sincerely,
Andreas Brand

Dear Fans, Players, Guests, Mentors and Volunteers,

A warm welcome to the mtu-Cup 2022!

Young, ambitious players who push forward, seize every opportunity and never give up –  that's what I like to see. I got hooked on football when I was young – I played in the university league when I was a student in Berlin –  and an exciting game inspires me to this day. So I'm truly delighted that the company I've just started to lead is the main sponsor of an important – if not the most important – under-15s football tournament in Europe. After the three-year Corona-induced gap, I'm sure everyone's greatly looking forward to mtu-Cup 2022. Working together with VfB Friedrichshafen, we've created a new, more up-to-date format for the event, which includes, amongst other things, an official change of name from MTU Indoor Football Cup to mtu-Cup.

Here at the company, we encourage young talents and promote youth development in many ways – one example being the mtu-Cup, and another the mtu Center of Excellence where upcoming football talents between the ages of 9 and 14 are welcome to come and develop different aspects of their game. I too believe very strongly that the future of a business lies in the hands of its next-generation staff. So I'm pleased to see that Rolls-Royce gives special priority to supporting its young employees. We constantly develop our training program, both to address the skills shortage problem and offer young people a perspective in their working lives.

I'd like to extend my warmest thanks to the football section of VfB Friedrichshafen, who organizes the mtu-Cup, as well as its volunteers, with a special mention for Klaus Segelbacher. Despite all the uncertainties thrown up by the pandemic, they put their life and soul into getting this great show on the road!

Dear Fans, I wish you two days of action-packed football, great sportsmanship, unforgettable goals and no end of fun at the mtu-Cup 2022!
 

Yours,
Jörg Stratmann