From 1989 onward, Christian Heidel tried to bring seriousness into the club. He had bought into a car dealership at twenty, his father was a mayor and head of construction in Mainz, and in 1992 he moved onto the board. “Mainz is home, a life’s mission, and this club is somewhere also my baby,” he would later say.\n\nIt was also, for a while, a coaching carousel. Between 1992 and 2001 Mainz changed coaches 15 times.
The last trainer to leave without cries of “Helau” was Eckhard Krautzun.