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At his official unveiling on Friday, Jürgen Klopp confirmed Kosicke will in future be "my assistant coach for strategy, development and innovation" at the DFB. To make that possible, he had already stepped down as managing director of his company Projekt Five and ended his previous advisory work for other coaches alongside Klopp. Kosicke has been at Klopp's side for around two decades and is regarded as his shadow man.
"It is not enough just to bring in a head coach," Klopp said. "We have to change a great many things. We want to turn over every stone." Kosicke is regarded as the "inventor" of the coach adviser, and he was by Julian Nagelsmann's side until 2021.
DFB president Bernd Neuendorf said of Kosicke's role: "We realised that Marc is an extremely important point of contact for Jürgen. It was clear that the two are so closely intertwined that they are only available as a package. The question is always in what role. Jürgen described it as assistant coach. For administrative matters that take place away from the pitch. That is how we understand it. Marc is to take on these tasks in future. Not as a DFB employee, but he has full access and coordinates things. He is an important interface within the association. Communication, sponsors, marketing - all these issues that concern the coaching team beyond football."
Previously, the Bremen-born self-confessed Werder fan also played an important role for Bayern Munich, by turning the Mia san mia mentality, already associated with Bayern Munich for decades, into an official slogan.
In 2023, Kosicke told the rather curious story behind it in an interview with SPOX and GOAL. The conversation was part of a major multimedia story about the history of Mia san mia, which was awarded the Großer Online-Preis 2023 by the Association of German Sports Journalists. You can read the interview from back then again here.
Mr Kosicke, you are a Werder fan and adviser to Borussia Dortmund's former successful coach Jürgen Klopp. How did it happen that of all people it was you who turned Mia san mia into Bayern Munich's official slogan?
Kosicke: In 2008, I was on my way to a FIFA event in Switzerland with my then business partner Oliver Bierhoff. By chance, Uli Hoeneß was on the same plane. He was complaining about his own players and lamenting that nobody knew what Bayern Munich was actually supposed to mean. I then asked Mr Hoeneß what exactly he thought Bayern Munich was supposed to mean, and he could not give me a clear answer.
What happened next?
Kosicke: I told him that I had worked at Nike and Adidas for a long time and that they have what are known as corporate bibles there, in which all employees are informed about the company's most important values and messages. He then asked me whether I could draft something like that for Bayern Munich.
And you could.
Kosicke: With 100 per cent cluelessness but a lot of self-confidence, I said yes (laughs). Uli Hoeneß also said that he wanted to see only me and no Roland Berger tie-wearing troupe. So we formed a heterogeneous working group with people from the fan shop and from marketing, with the kit man and the youth coordinator, with Stefan Mennerich from the media department and chief scout Wolfgang Dremmler. For four weeks, we worked together on Bayern Munich's values.
IMAGOAnd in the end it was Mia san mia?
Kosicke: No, the slogan was fixed in my mind from the very beginning. I already had it in my head during my conversation with Hoeneß on the plane. But I did not mention it then, because otherwise I would have shot all my powder at once. Together with the working group, we then only developed the values to go with it.
Which values did you come up with?
Kosicke: In the end, we agreed on 16 commandments. For example: "We are a family and stand by one another." Or: "We do not communicate about one another in public."
How did Hoeneß like the result?
Kosicke: For the presentation to the board, I had a few prototypes of the bible bound in genuine leather from lederhosen. When I unveiled the title, everyone was delighted. Hoeneß said: "Great slogan, but this MIR is a space station." The front did not say "Mia san mia", it said "Mir san mir". As someone from Bremen, I did not have a 100 per cent command of Bavarian. That was the only thing we still had to change.
What happened after that?
Kosicke: Apart from the bible, I also developed an accompanying roadmap for implementation within the club for Bayern Munich. That was the end of my task. When I issued the invoice, I assigned my rights to the slogan and assured them: "Do not worry, as someone from Bremen and Jürgen Klopp's adviser, I will not present myself as the great inventor of Mia san mia." Every new arrival, whether an employee in the office, a youth player from Fürstenfeldbruck or Sadio Mane, was supposed to be handed this bible as an onboarding measure after his move to Bayern Munich, with the message: This is what we are like, these are the values we live by.
How present was the term Mia san mia before you made it the official slogan?
Kosicke: I had known it since I experienced a late Werder defeat against Bayern Munich at the Weserstadion as a teenager. The next day, the newspaper spoke of Bayern's Mia-san-mia attitude. That always stayed in my mind. Back then, however, the attitude behind Mia san mia was more present than the term itself.