'Every setback also has a positive' - Jaissle

[Getty Images] Matthias Jaissle points to his neck. "I had a tumour when I was five years old," the Newcastle United head coach says. "Here in my neck so I couldn't move it anymore. "That was a period where I already learned a lot about life, how important it is to be healthy, and how grateful you can be to be healthy and to follow your dream. "It was not clear that I could play football as a kid anymore." He did not elaborate further, but such perspective would be needed. Jaissle, like so many, visualised one day becoming a professional footballer, but he was among the rare few to actually go on to do so. The former Hoffenheim defender even felt he was on the verge of a senior call up to the German national team at one stage, only to suffer a serious knee injury. He was just 20 at the time. Jaissle refused to give up, and "kept the dream for a lot longer than the doctors did", but the setback ultimately curtailed his career and he retired a few years later in 2014. It left him in a dark place, as he previously detailed in an interview with BBC Sport, but the "wounds" he experienced in life have shaped him. "That makes you the person you are, whatever aspect it is, with the belief you can overcome every obstacle," he says. "Every setback also has a positive side. If you overcome these challenges then you become stronger, more resilient." This outlook gave Jaissle a head start in his second career, but he did not necessarily plan on being a coach. Not at first. Ralf Rangnick, his former manager at Hoffenheim, invited him on to a training programme at RB Leipzig, where his mentor was working at the time, to sample life behind the scenes at the club. Jaissle was due to be redeployed in a new department every six weeks and started his placement as an assistant youth team coach to ex team-mate Sebastien Hoeness, who now manages Stuttgart. He was pencilled in to spend time with the club's sporting director and figures from their administrative, commercial and marketing departments. But he never ended up doing so. "I didn't move on," Jaissle says. "After two weeks, wow, I felt joy back in life." Read more on Jaissle