Kevin Großkreutz has in his podcast Grosskreutz & Küpper revealed new details about his brawl during his time at VfB Stuttgart and the subsequent stay in hospital.
In 2017, the former German national player was involved in a fight in downtown Stuttgart and was injured so badly that he had to go to the hospital. Grosskreutz had previously attended a high school party with several youth players from VfB. After this incident, the Swabians were forced to terminate the contract with the 2014 world champion.
“Of course you have to own up to mistakes,” explained the 34-year-old in his podcast. “You have to say about the fight: I didn’t make a mistake. I didn’t hit anyone. I was hit by three or four men. And then I was on the ground and someone kicked me in the face. I didn’t hurt anyone.”
“It was always pushed so high because of the youth players,” Grosskreutz said, looking back on the headlines that the incident made afterwards. “They were 17, 18 or something like that. They were out there too. We met. They went to party. They would have gone to party without me and would definitely have gone to party again the week after.”
The right-back, who now plays for TuS Bövinghausen in the Oberliga Westfalen, apologized for his action, which finally caused his departure from VfB Stuttgart: “It was a stupid action, it sucked. You have to stand by it. Me I just wanted to go out. I was injured too, maybe it didn’t go over too well. Ultimately, that’s what happened. If it hadn’t happened, I might still have played for VfB.”
Grosskreutz: “That was never a reason for dismissal”
Grosskreutz blames the former Stuttgart sports director Jan Schindelmeiser for his expulsion from Stuttgart: “I think he (Schindelmeiser, editor’s note) was waiting for it. I think if someone else had been there, I would have been not been fired. It was such a thing. He was great as a human being, I don’t want to shoot him, but he was a little bit peculiar. And not for me.”
“He (Schindelmeiser, editor’s note) was of the opinion that we should go our separate ways. Of course I didn’t think so, but we then agreed. That was never a reason for termination. I didn’t do anything. I didn’t hurt anyone or anything,” Grosskreutz continued.
During his subsequent hospital stay, the Dortmund native revealed that he was injured worse than previously known: “They saw something that they probably had to cut their heads open. Of course I panicked,” explained Großkreutz. “I was totally gone, they drew blood from my head, they did an MRI, they saw a black spot, they wanted to operate on me, that would have been the worst thing that could have happened.”
