Matthias Langkamp

Matthias Langkamp

Personal information
Full name	Matthias Langkamp
Date of birth	February 24, 1984 (1984-02-24) (age 27)
Place of birth	Speyer, West Germany
Height	1.91 m (6 ft 3 in)
Playing position	Defender
Club information
Current club	Free agent
Youth career
?–1989	Sportfreunde Merfeld
1989–2001	Preußen Münster
2001–2004	Arminia Bielefeld
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps†	(Gls)†
2004–2005	Arminia Bielefeld	27	(0)
2005–2006	VfL Wolfsburg	1	(0)
2006–2007	Grasshopper-Club Zürich	12	(1)
2007–2008	Arminia Bielefeld	13	(0)
2008–2009	Panionios	9	(0)
2009–2011	Karlsruher SC	37	(4)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of 25 January 2011. † Appearances (Goals).

Matthias Langkamp (born February 24, 1984 in Speyer) is a German footballer.

Career

Langkamp first signed professional terms with Arminia Bielefeld and enjoyed a highly-impressive debut season in the Bundesliga in the 2004/05 season. Considered a very promising young talent at that time, he courted the attention of a host of bigger clubs and was eventually bought by Wolfsburg. However, there he failed to impress manager Holger Fach, who relegated Langkamp to the reserve team ^[1] and only granted him one appearance for the first team before offloading him to Swiss club Grasshoppers.

After a season in Switzerland, Langkamp returned to his former club Arminia Bielefeld ^[2] and at the beginning of the season he enjoyed a remarkable return to form. However, after a strong challenge during a match against Duisburg, strangely Langkamp appeared to still be concussed even a week after the match.^[3] Upon return from his injury, Langkamp suffered a dramatic loss of form and confidence. After his error led to a crucial goal for opponents Cottbus, he had to endure a very public on-pitch dressing down from his team-mates.^[4] He fell out of favour for the remainder of the season and rarely featured in the first team again.

Langkamp was not offered a new contract by Arminia Bielefeld, who released him at the end of the 2007/08 season. He then secured a contract with Panionios F.C. in the Greek Super League and played a number of games for them in the 2008/09 season, becoming a popular figure amongst the local fans.

He returned to Germany after one season, signing with Karlsruher SC on 29 June 2009. In his first season back in Germany however, his attempts to re-establish himself have thus far been thwarted by a diabolical injury jinx. Although he found himself out of the side initially, he later forced his way into the team and looked impressive, scoring 2 goals. However, just as he was gaining momentum, in November he went into the treatment room complaining of a pain in his hamstrings; upon investigation, the physio found that he would need an operation on his Achilles tendon. When he went in for the operation, the surgeon discovered that he would actually need operations on both of his Achilles tendons.^[5]

The operations kept Langkamp on the sidelines until late March 2010.^[6] He made his comeback against Hansa Rostock, coming on as a late substitute and playing for 2 minutes. But his next substitute appearance proved to be a disaster - with his first tackle he conceded a penalty and with his second tackle he injured himself, damaging his left shoulder joint and effectively ending his season as he required surgery.^[7]

Langkamp fought his way back to fitness in time for the 2010/11 season and was involved in the pre-season build-up. However, on 19 July 2010, Langkamp suffered further injury heartache when he slipped up whilst attempting a sprint and tore a muscle in his right thigh.^[8] It is not yet known when he will be fit to return to action.

Personal

His brother Sebastian Langkamp is a professional footballer as well.

International career

Langkamp has played two games for the Under-21 German national team.

References

1. ^ [1]
2. ^ [2]
3. ^ [3]
4. ^ [4]
5. ^ [5]
6. ^ [6]
7. ^ [7]
8. ^ [http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ksc.de%2Faktuelles%2Fanzeigen%2Fnews%2Fmuskelfaserriss-bei-mlangkamp%2F6.html]

External links

• Profile at Panionio's website
• (German) Career stats at fussballdaten.de

Persondata
Name	Langkamp, Matthias
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1984-02-24
Place of birth	Speyer, West Germany
Date of death
Place of death