Ballack, Michael

Michael Ballack, (born September 26, 1976, Görlitz, East Germany [now in Germany]), German professional football (soccer) midfielder who was named the German Footballer of the Year three times (2002, 2003, 2005).

Ballack grew up in Chemnitz in East Germany during the era of a divided Germany. There he played youth football with FC Karl-Marx-Stadt (Chemnitzer FC from 1990). Chemnitz gave him his first professional contract in 1995, and in 1997 he transferred to FC Kaiserslautern, which had just been promoted to the Bundesliga (Germany’s top football division). He appeared in 16 matches in his inaugural campaign with Kaiserslautern, as the team became the first club to win the Bundesliga title in its first season after a promotion.

In 1999 Ballack joined Bayer Leverkusen, where he broke through to become one of the elite players in Germany. While he earned his first German Footballer of the Year award in 2002, that year ultimately proved to be one of frustrating near triumphs for Ballack and his teammates: Bayer Leverkusen finished second in the Bundesliga and lost both the German Cup and Champions League finals, while the German national team (of which Ballack had been a member since 1999) advanced to the World Cup final but was defeated by Brazil. Moreover, Ballack was not even able to play in the final World Cup match, because of an accumulation of yellow cards throughout the tournament.

After the 2002 World Cup, Ballack signed with German power Bayern Munich, where he was once again a member of a Bundesliga championship-winning squad in his first year with a new franchise; Ballack powered Bayern Munich to both the league title and the German Cup en route to earning the 2003 German Footballer of the Year award. Bayern captured the league-cup double again in both 2005 and 2006, with Ballack earning national Player of the Year honours in 2005. He was named captain of the German national team in 2004. In the 2006 World Cup, which Germany hosted, he led the national team to a third-place showing.

Ballack’s contract with Bayern ended at the close of the 2005–06 season, which led to a heated bidding for his services by the top European clubs. He ultimately signed with England’s Chelsea FC and became for a time the highest-paid footballer in the world. With Chelsea, Ballack had a hand in a Premier League championship in 2010, three FA Cup titles (2007, 2009, and 2010), and a second-place finish in the Champions League in 2008. He was in position to captain Germany in the 2010 World Cup, but an ankle injury that he suffered during the 2010 FA Cup final resulted in his being ruled out for the tournament. In June 2010 he signed a contract to return to Bayer Leverkusen for two seasons. He retired from professional football in October 2012.