It was tricky at times. Weiss rates the standard of training last season as the highest that he has known, Stuttgart beating Bayern Munich to second in the Bundesliga. Chase was in every session, playing one-touch with Deniz Undav and the rest.
“In the beginning, the other players would yell at him because he was not good enough. They would literally be screaming because he was constantly playing bad passes, constantly under pressure. He was not doing well. Eventually, he started catching up.”
There was a moment towards the end of the season when Undav complimented him on his transformation. He had won the trust of his team-mates. “I saw the development in front of my eyes,” says Weiss. “When I look back, I get goosebumps thinking about it.”
Looking back, the high standards helped him. “This kid is a product of his environment. You see him now and he can play these quick passes. He has been raised on this because it is the only football environment that he knows because he started so late.”
Sebastian Hoeness, Stuttgart’s head coach, deserves credit for keeping him around. There was a time when Weiss had felt like a lone voice when backing the player. Others had seen the flaws in Chase’s game. It took Hoeness to see the possibilities instead.
“He was the first to judge the player subjectively,” explains Weiss, “to see Anrie’s development within the context of his young career. You have to have that imagination to see what he could become. That is why I give Basti as many flowers as I can for this.”
Jurgen Klopp was known to be intrigued by those players who had extreme talents, outliers who were capable of things others were not. He reasoned that he could work on the weaknesses, hide them within his system. He wanted players who had special gifts.
Chase, a defender of prodigious speed and strength, fits the bill. Weiss uses an analogy to highlight this point. “If I were to show you a boy who could jump five metres but then you do not see him do it again, you would still know he had the ability to do it,” he says.
“Anrie would have situations in training where he would do something that was at a very high level. You might not see it again for 45 minutes or even a week. But if he could do it once, what if he could do it consistently? Basti recognised that. He saw the potential.”
Even in his brief senior career so far, there have been those moments that showcased his potential. Standing up to Vinicius was a highlight, even when being asked to play out of position at right-back. In the long term, a move to the centre of defence is inevitable.
“He has a profile that a lot of players do not have. He is a giant. He is very strong. He is fast. He is incredible in the air. So, if we could just get him to do the simple things, he would be great. It was about getting the basics right so he was clean and consistent.
“In the beginning, he needed to learn how to pass the ball with no mistakes. Then it became about making progressive passes, thinking about the game a bit. When you watch him now, he can see those passes during the build-up and it looks sharp.”
