This isn’t the first time that FC Barcelona and Borussia Dortmund will face off in the Champions League this season. However, the change of coach in the German team after the dismissal of Nuri Sahin will allow Hansi Flick to reunite with his mentor, Niko Kovac, who he worked with as an assistant coach at Bayern Munich before becoming his successor and conquering a historic ‘sextuple’. However, their relationship started to develop much earlier.

The relationship between Flick and Kovac began in 2006

Hansi Flick and Niko Kovac met back in 2006, when the current manager of Barcelona was working as an assistant to the controversial Giovanni Trapattoni at RB Salzburg. Interestingly, Niko Kovac was in Austria, squeezing out his last drops as a player, and was part of that team. However, they barely had time to build a relationship because, after 11 matches, Hansi Flick accepted Germany’s offer to become assistant coach to Joachim Löw for the 2006 World Cup.

Thirteen years later, they would reunite at Bayern Munich. Interestingly, Hansi Flick was still working as an assistant coach and joined Niko Kovac's staff, who was considered the coach of the moment in Germany and had already been in the role for one season. However, a crushing defeat to Eintracht early in the 2019/2020 season led to Kovac's dismissal. Bayern chose Flick as his replacement, and in just a few months, he built a machine that won the Bundesliga, the DFB POKAL, and the Champions League… later adding the German Supercup, the UEFA Supercup, and the FIFA Club World Cup.

Niko Kovac praises Hansi Flick

Since then, Hansi Flick’s career as a coach has experienced a remarkable rise, while Niko Kovac's has begun to fade. “Hansi is a great coach. You could already see he had the qualities to become a good head coach,” said Niko Kovac ahead of the match between Borussia Dortmund and Barcelona in the Champions League quarterfinals.

Interestingly, this will be the first time in their careers that Hansi Flick and Niko Kovac will face each other, and it will certainly be a special match for both coaches. “It will be nice because we worked together, he was my assistant, and now we will compete against each other,” Niko Kovac pointed out. We’ll see if, now as managers of FC Barcelona and Borussia Dortmund, the student Hansi Flick can prove that he has surpassed his mentor Niko Kovac.