Chinedu Ede played in the Bundesliga at 19, became European Under-21 Champion with Neuer and Hummels. However, he was denied a great career – partly because he didn’t want it at all.
Either Kevin-Prince Boateng or Chinedu Ede – usually there was only one of the two. “At the indoor tournaments in Berlin, sometimes I was top scorer and sometimes he was,” Ede tells us in the new episode. “I’ve known him since the E-youth.”
At the age of 19, both played side by side for Hertha BSC in the Bundesliga – then they went their separate ways. While Boateng played for Tottenham, Dortmund, Milan or Barça, Ede became European Under-21 champion in 2009 together with Manuel Neuer, Mats Hummels or Mesut Özil, but he did not manage to play more than 28 Bundesliga and 109 second division games for Hertha, Duisburg, Union, Mainz and Kaiserslautern. In 2019, Ede ended his career with regional league club VSG Altglienicke.
I was the last to come and the first to go.
“I got stuck on my talent at some point, while he developed two-footed,” Ede explains in the podcast – and admits that it also had something to do with his attitude. “After training, most of them stayed outside and practised something. I was the last to come and the first to leave. (…) I just wanted to dribble a bit and then go home again.”
Becoming a Bundesliga professional – unlike most others – was not a goal of his that he had been working towards his whole life: “I started at some point, probably because it was the cheapest sport, but it was never my dream,” he says in conversation with Alex Schlüter and Benni Zander. “I didn’t care if I played in front of 60,000 people or five. “
In retrospect, he thinks today, “an individual sport would probably have been better for me. My character absolutely doesn’t fit. In the beginning I also rebelled, but at some point I learned to just say yes, do what I want anyway – and pretend I was listening. “
