Seifert Succession: Donata Hops becomes DFL

The 45-year-old is currently still working with the BCG Digital Ventures, a company of the Boston Consulting Group, and will compete for its new task on 1 January 2022. According to the statutory, she also assumes the function as a spokeswoman of the DFL-Bureau. Your contract runs until 31 December 2024.

Donata Hops is the right personality for one of the most important positions in German football, says the chairman of the Supervisory Board Peter Peters. In a time of change, it has all the qualities and great enforcement to lead the DFL within the meaning of the clubs of the Bundesliga and 2nd Bundesliga into a continuing successful future. This is especially true with regard to their extensive experience in the fields of media and Digitization - with a clear commitment to social responsibility in all facets.

Bundesliga and 2nd Bundesliga also enjoy an excellent reputation as the DFL worldwide. All this is about preserving more technological, social and medical changes in the field of football.

Donata hops

Hops, which has been awarded in 2014 as a media woman of the year in Germany, started her career in the company consultancy Accenture. Later she went to Axel-Springer-Verlag and, among other things, worked as chairman of the publishing business of the image group. German professional football has a great tradition and is deeply anchored in society. Bundesliga and 2nd Bundesliga also enjoy an excellent reputation as the DFL worldwide. This is all about the background of technological, social and medical changes in the field of football Contain - and at the same time develop innovatively, she says today to her new task at the DFL.

Vibration in the industry according to Seiferts farewell announcement

The Liga Association thus creates clarity after the previous DFL Managing Director Seifert has surprisingly announced his withdrawal in October 2020, not to extend his contract on his until summer 2022. Now his contract will even be resolved prematurely at the end of the year, but he is then sided in consulting function, it is called by the DFL.

Seifert had previously made himself strong to lead the German professional football through the Corona crisis, in which several clubs had been close to the bankruptcy. With the highly praised and much placed hygiene concept of DFL to maintain the game operation, Seifert may well be described as Savior of an Industry, which actively employs more than 50,000 people in Germany, but is one of the country's most important entertainment companies. He rejected a special position of professional football in the pandemic, but still did everything that the store continued. That the losses losses in the European comparison rather slightly failed, including that belongs to his legacy.

Fairytale TV contracts

Since 2005, Seifert worked for the DFL. Thanks to its negotiating skills, he moved to fairytale TV contracts for the 36 professional clubs on land, which also resulted in the fact that salaries and remedies increased, sometimes shot in astronomical heights. But he also had no means against the last increasingly increasing financial cleavage of the league.

Christian Seifert is likely to be predicted by the Chairman of the Supervisory Board of German sports aid. Picture Alliance / DPA / Revierfoto

The topics, which now wait for Seifers successor, are manifold and maximum challenging: the fairer distribution of the TV funds, the debate about the 50-plus-1 rule also in the light of international competitiveness and not least the interaction with the trailing DFB . All this will be high hurdles that apply in these times.

Seiffert's future still open

Which professional path of the 52-year-old Seifert will be crimping in the future, he has not decided yet. Seifert, who had received offers from FC Bayern Munich and Bayer Leverkusen in recent years, will definitely stay in Frankfurt am Main with his family.