Victoria Schneanderbeck: uprising leader says ‘Ade’

What started at the age of seven on the sports field and the Kirchberg/Rapp lawns has led Schneiderbeck to the best clubs in Europe. At the age of 16 she moved with her longtime companion Karina Weininger from Styria to Munich to Bayern, the club of her heart. “When I was a kid, I took pride in collecting posters; Lothar Matthaus, Stefan Effenberg and Roy Mackay hung on my bed. It was my own initiative to come to Bayern Munich. I wanted to go abroad, and Bayern was the obvious choice, so I asked if I could stop by for a A trial session,” she describes the move abroad on her website.

Two championships and one cup with Bayern

Schneiderbeck, initially a midfielder and then a central defender, won two league and cup titles with Bayern before moving to England in 2018 and playing for Arsenal and most recently Tottenham. However, in Munich, not only did her rapid ascent begin, but also her misery due to a prolonged injury. On March 24, 2008, at the age of 17, she ruptured her cruciate ligament a few minutes after making her competitive debut with Bayern Munich. She concluded, “At seventeen, the end of my career was already nigh. I learned one thing and realized early on: Nothing should be taken for granted, take every moment football gives you. Looking back, it has You did it very well,” until Wednesday.

The comeback was also short-lived, in March 2009 the cruciate ligament in his right knee ruptured again in the Bayern 2 game. Injuries continued with a meniscus tear, persistent inflammation of the patellar tendon and cartilage damage. Schnaderbeck has now had eight knee surgeries. “I almost had knee problems,” she said in June while preparing for the European Championship.

ID number despite infection problems

Because the highlights of her career were also in jeopardy due to the knee injuries she had suffered before. But Schnaderbeck made his way, getting back in shape in time and making his way into the Austrian sports history books in the red, white and red jersey. As a captain, the defender led the women’s team of the Austrian Football Association to participate for the first time in the European Championship, which led to the semi-finals in 2017 in the Netherlands. Schnaderbeck was in all five games.

The “Summer Fairy Tale” brought good television ratings, encouraged the audience to watch a women’s soccer match at home for the first time, and brought the Austrian Football Association women’s team from coach Dominic Talhammer the Austrian Team of the Year award for 2017.

EM 2022 as “The Last Dance”

Five years later, before the second major tournament, Schneiderback had a thing of deja vu. The leader was injured, won the race over time and came back in the middle of the next event. Schnaderbeck led her teammates onto the field in front of 68,871 spectators in the opening match against hosts England on July 6 at ‘Theatre of Dreams’, Old Trafford in Manchester United. “It was a little dream come true for me,” she said afterwards.

The second European Championship was also a huge success by reaching the quarter-finals. Not only strong performances remain unforgettable, but also the joy that you openly experience. After success against Northern Ireland, the ÖFB women have evolved into true ‘celebration monsters’ with a party in the cab and storming the press conference – with the captain in the middle. “It doesn’t happen often that you are part of a tournament like this. We want to enjoy the moments as a team and celebrate the victories in the truest sense of the word. The things that connect after that, those are the stories we will be doing again in the coming years,” Schreiderbeck justified the exuberant mood.

‘I couldn’t have imagined a better ending’

The perfect end to a great career. “I couldn’t have imagined a nicer ending than with and with the national team, my second family. In England at the Euros, things came back full circle, on the highest stage in European women’s football,” Schnaerbeck said as part of her emotional post. Farewell, and, looking back, he affirmed, “I’ll do it the same way again.”

The Masters in Business Psychology graduate, who has served as a keynote speaker for years, has not only pioneered the field. In December 2019, Styria debuted as the Austrian team’s first player when she posted a love photo with her partner on Instagram. “Thanks to my future wife Anna, without you I wouldn’t have had the strength to come back and experience EM on the pitch like this,” Schnaerbeck said on Wednesday. The first goal after career now is a trip with her friend to Asia. After that she was “in the mood to really let it go”. Where exactly, remains to be seen.