In Rangnick’s one season, Southwick finished second to Chichester City, missing a penalty in the final game of the season against Chichester that would have swung the title their way. On most Saturday afternoons they drank beer in the clubhouse after games and the expenses the club paid barely covered the petrol money for the journey home. But they loved it and Rangnick’s affection for the club was evident when Southwick FC were brought to their knees financially two years ago. The cost of bringing their old ground up to standard forced them out the league. Rangnick donated £1,000 personally to the cause.
Adrian Batchelor, 63, a retired wealth management advisor, was a team-mate of Rangnick. Batchelor is part of the effort to bring a Southwick team back to the Old Barn Way ground, which is now leased by the foundation set-up by Brighton-boy Russell Martin, manager at Swansea City. The intention is to build a strong community club. Batchelor remembers Rangnick as a useful full-back and midfielder who played around 10 games for the first team and some for the seconds. Batchelor, then a right-back, was playing in the game in which Rangnick was injured.
“It was one of those robust tackles from the 1970s” Batchelor says. “Ralf was quite slight and I suppose it was unfortunate. I appeared on a documentary about him made for German television and in that Ralf says his time in England was when he learned that more physical side of the game. He puts it down as a big part of his development. He was a good player. A nice bloke who took his football very seriously.”
The stories of Rangnick studiously warming up on his own while his team-mates sought the warmth of the clubhouse are also true. “He was quite happy to go out an hour before and have a run around,” Batchelor recalls. He notes that programme Q&A with Rangnick that asked the usual questions that were asked of footballers in the 1970s. “To the question ‘Ambition?’ Ralf had said ‘Pro football’,” Batchelor says. “I look at that now and think at 21 he must have known then he wouldn’t be a professional footballer so he surely meant a coach of some sort. He knew then what he wanted to do.”
The club captain around that time was Phil Quinlan, now 69, a retired financial advisor, and he recalls the final title decider against Chichester. A print strike meant that the local newspapers could not publicise the game yet even so, Quinlan says around 2,000 turned up. Rangnick was on the bench and watched as striker Mick Edmonds missed the penalty that would have won the league. A fitting introduction to English football. “We had won the first nine games of the season, but somehow we still needed to beat Chichester to win the title,” Quinlan says.
“It was only a few years ago that someone said to me, ‘This bloke who is high up in German football used to play with you at Southwick’. At first I just couldn’t place it, and then I looked at the pictures and it was Ralf, that young lad from all those years ago”.
