[ Background – from football to law and back again ]

I started playing football in a club when I was 6 or 7. Football was my passion. Back then, I still had the romantic thought of making it as a pro. I’d say, I was pretty decent, I played in the highest youth level in Austria, competing with the big clubs like Austria and Rapid.

As I was getting a little bit older, around 15 or 16, when things like girls and partying and all this stuff became interesting as well, I understood pretty fast the level of commitment it would take (to become a pro). Ultimately, I knew it wasn't for me. I didn’t want to sacrifice every day for football.

I played until I was 18, got my IBs and, having no clue what I wanted to do, I started studying law. I thought, at least with law, you’re open to do different things. A lot of people start studying law but I think - not just in Austria - there’s a huge drop out rate in the first one or two semesters. I somehow managed to get past the first few exams pretty easily and then hit a ‘point of no return’ where I didn’t want to waste the 4 semesters I already took and decided to continue and finish the degree.

Before I finished my law studies, I went to Athens for an Erasmus semester. At the time, I really wanted to leave Vienna at some point. My grandfather is Greek as well, so I felt a connection and I loved it there. When I returned to Vienna, I already knew the classical law stuff was never meant for me. I’ve finished my law studies but to become an ‘actual’ lawyer, you need to take a big exam that people often spend 2-3 years studying for. I was never interested in that.

I knew I wanted to combine my law background with my passion for football. So, I moved to Barcelona and started a master’s in sports management at ISDE. I had an amazing 9 months there.

After Barcelona, I moved to Düsseldorf - in Germany - and did an internship at a sports media company. After the internship, they offered me a job but at the time I wanted to see and experience something else, therefore I decided to move on!

Instead, I did another internship in Munich, working for the Bavarian Football Federation. I really enjoyed this internship. At the time, I’d been abroad for almost 3 years and I got kind of homesick. I think I needed to get away from Vienna to understand how much I appreciated it.

I decided to come back to Vienna and spent about 3 or 4 months searching for a job. The job opportunities are pretty limited. Of course in a highly competitive job market like football, there is only a limited number of opportunities: There’s the FA, the league and a handful of clubs. Fortunately, it worked out quite nicely for me and I started just over a year ago in February 2024 at the Austrian Bundesliga.

[ ISDE ]

ISDE was an amazing time. If anyone is thinking about maybe going abroad, I can give it my full recommendation. It’s worth the risk! And if it doesn’t work out, no problem, then just come home. At the time, when I was considering whether to go to Barcelona or not, I thought, if I’m 50 years old, I’ll absolutely regret not doing it - so I went!

I loved my time there. We had maybe 35 or 40 people in the class from almost 30 different countries. There’s no better way to get connected with people from all over the world - and they all have the same interest, they love football.

Although it was a master’s in sports management and law, a law degree was not required, so we had people coming from finance or politics and all kinds of backgrounds with the common goal to work in football someday. We had a variety of classes, things like sports marketing, governance, gaming operations, law and finance. This exposure helps you understand what you’re most interested in.

For me, it was the springboard to the international football world. From the first lesson, the teachers told us directly, if you don't have LinkedIn, get it now, because without a network, there’s no way you can make it in football. You have to put yourself out there and get to know people. At first, I didn’t quite understand - and of course, networking isn’t only limited to LinkedIn - but it’s the brutal truth.

Now, wherever I go, on every continent, there’s always someone I know - football can be a small world as well.

[ How did you find your current job? ]

Luckily, I had met someone in my network who told me there would be a job opening coming up. Then, everything happened pretty quickly, a couple of weeks later I spoke to the CEO, then I had a couple meetings and an assignment and a month later, I was starting the job.

[ What is the CEO of a league responsible for? How do you support this? ]

The league has 3 board members. I’m the personal assistant to the Chairman, Christian Ebenbauer. He’s responsible for all the operations inside the league and is also the public face of the league - especially regarding ‘outside presentation’ everything from interviews to managing sponsors.

The other board members, David Reisenauer and Alex Schwärzler are responsible for the match operations, the licensing and all the financials, respectively.

If I had to describe my role very briefly, I’d say my job is to make Christian’s life easier. Basically meaning, everything that comes to his mind from organizing his emails or his calendar to helping out in different departments. My job covers three pillars: classic assistance, HR manager and responsibility for organizing all the committees (supervisory board, general assembly and club conferences). I’m not a ‘classic’ assistant in that I’m also in charge of some things like data security. My law background helps and means I’m able to get involved in different departments and subjects when help is needed.

[ Is this the type of job you had in mind when you were at ISDE and just getting into football as a career choice? ]

To be honest, I had no idea what I was about to do. I always thought quite highly of those people who knew already at 14 or 15 what they wanted to do. At that age, I was like, well, I just found out, I’m probably not becoming a pro!

Now though, I think there are people who are specialists in a specific topic and there are those who are more generalists. I’d definitely say I’m a generalist. I enjoy being able to do a lot of different things and I’ve started to understand that generalists can be a big asset to organizations.

I think the job I’m doing now is a perfect fit. It combines so many different topics. I would never have imagined back then that I’d be in this position and learning about all these different departments. I didn’t know it existed when I was studying but at the moment, it’s basically my dream job!

[ What are some of the Bundesliga’s goals? Do you see them in ‘competition’ with the biggest leagues? ]

I'd say you obviously need to see it from a realistic point of view. There's just no way in the real world that we're able to compete with the ‘Big 5’. It's just different circumstances and there are different possibilities. We want to take a realistic approach, we want to be competitive internationally but we also know our status or role as a mid-sized league and the responsibilities and possibilities that come along with that. Obviously, we need to take a different approach than the biggest leagues and keep innovating and get the most out of our potential.

We’ve had some very good performances in the last few years with Red Bull Salzburg, Sturm Graz, LASK and Rapid. In relation to the financial possibilities of other leagues, our clubs have overperformed for some time now. I think in 2022, we were in 10th place in the UEFA 5 years ranking, which was amazing. We got a lot of UEFA contribution payments because of that. Now, I think we’ve slipped to 13th, which is more or less where we are supposed to be in terms of financial background, but of course, we will try to climb again.

This UEFA ranking is an important metric for the league and for the CEO - it’s not the main priority but, as you can imagine, with good performances comes more financial contributions which in turn means more investment in the clubs, in the infrastructure and helping the second division.

[ How do the FA and the league work together? ]

The national football association, the ÖFB is kind of like our ‘mother’ - they’re on top of the pyramid. There are 10 members of the ÖFB, the 9 states inside Austria all have their own state associations and we - the league - are the 10th member. We’re responsible for the first and second divisions and the ÖFB is responsible for the regional leagues - everything from the 3rd level and down including grassroots, youth development and of course, the national teams as well.

[ Is there ever conflict between the Bundesliga’s goals and the ÖFB’s goals? (e.g. Red Bull Salzburg has produced a huge amount of world class players in the last 10+ years but the majority haven’t been eligible for the Austrian national team) ]

There is not a lot of conflict because we generally have common goals to promote Austrian football and to give the best frameworks and platforms for the players to succeed.

In the example you gave with Salzburg, there’s an instrument called the ‘Austria Pot’, which is a way for the ÖFB to give money to clubs that produce Austrian players. There are some statistical requirements but basically, the more minutes young Austrian players get, the more money the club gets, which tries to incentivize clubs to give playing time to young Austrian talents. Salzburg, for example, decided not to participate in this program because they would like to go another way and take another approach. Each club can decide and it depends from club to club. And of course, you also have to take into account that some of the players who don't make it into the first team of Salzburg go on to have successful careers at other clubs.

[ You mentioned the ongoing negotiations around the upcoming broadcasting rights - the TV deal - I assume this is one of the most important things financially for the league? ]

Not even one of the most, it’s by far the most important! This is where the big money comes in.

The current TV deal expires after the 2025/26 season meaning we’re talking now about a deal that would start from the 2026/27 season.

[ Is this negotiation only for the rights inside Austria, or also outside Austria? ]

For both. It depends on what kind of companies are interested in the foreign rights. I mean, honestly, as the Austrian Bundesliga, the opportunity or possibility that a big American or South American corporation comes along to buy the rights would be a nice surprise. It’s more about the DACH region (Germany, Austria and Switzerland) and then maybe a little around Europe.

It’s a pretty exciting time! Christian - who is working a lot on this - has been working with the league for 15 or 20 years and has already experienced 5 or 6 different cycles of media rights tenders. It’s crazy how complex things can get but it’s very interesting to be a part of.

[ Do you have to stay neutral as a fan while you’re working at the league? ]

I think it's very important to keep in mind that we're a professional company. Obviously, some people that work here might have a favorite club but it’s always professionalism over passion. Personally, I grew up watching a lot of Austrian football but - my teams are Real Madrid and Arsenal.

I think many people have the romantic thought that everyone working in professional football is just watching football all day but there’s all the same administrative and management stuff that’s the same as many other jobs. You just do it for a football club or a league but many of the tasks are basically the same.

Of course, it comes with a lot of advantages, I can attend pretty much every league match for free if I want to! One of the best moments for me was during Euro 2024, we organized a whole trip for the league’s staff to fly to Berlin and watch Austria against Poland. Being able to fly with your whole crew, as a fan, to support the national team - that’s the kind of thing I think everybody dreams about when working in football.

[ You called this your ‘dream job’ at the moment – do you have any future work plans? ]

It’s quite hard to say because, like in the past, I’m taking it day by day and enjoying it a lot. Still, I doubt I’ll work in professional football for the rest of my life. It can be a very stressful and hectic environment. You need to be a person who doesn’t let things get too near or too personal.

I think working for the league is not even as stressful as working for a club because I usually have a ‘normal’ Monday to Friday, 9-5 job. Of course, sometimes there are different hours or it’s busier but at a club, you have every weekend packed with a match and all the stress that comes with it. If your club wins, everyone is happy on Monday but if you lose a few games in a row, it’s going to be very stressful and negative. At the league, it’s a more structured and neutral environment but you need to understand what you’re getting into!

So, while I definitely see myself continuing to work in football for some time, I don’t think it will be for the rest of my life. There are a lot of things I’d like to experience outside of football, or even combining football with something else.