EVERY story has two sides, and Dietmar Hopp, the owner of Hoffenheim, knows it full well. In 1972, this visionary founded a company that is currently the most valuable in Germany, and he has been donating large amounts for humanitarian causes: sums higher than 600 million euros are being mentioned.

However, due to his entrance in the football world (to help his beloved club and not to earn money), his multi-billionaire status has brought him more insults than the epithet earned as one of the world's greatest humanitarians has ever brought him praise.

Fans perceive him as a tradition breaker while defending the rule that favors the big players

In Germany, fans are punished and matches are stopped because of him. On the pitch, players refuse to play football and stand up for him, while banners with crosshairs of a sniper rifle drawn all over his face are unfurled on the stands. It clearly shows how much he is hated.  

The public polarizing this much over a single man would be difficult to find elsewhere, even the history doesn't remember many characters who attracted that much attention. 

The German fans saw in Hopp a man who goes against the tradition because of the ownership rule 50+1 in the German football, according to which the fans hold the majority of a club's ownership. The rest of the 49% can belong to investors and sponsors. The exception to the rule is made when a person invests in a club for more than 20 years. That's the way an individual or a company becomes entitled to the majority ownership of the club.

This rule allowed the German clubs not to slip into debt and ensured that their stadiums were filled to the last spot. However, the rule also has its flaw, which reflects the hypocrisy of fans who are irritated by people like Hopp.

The existing rule makes the domination of historically stronger clubs easier, i.e., the clubs from stronger backgrounds, and that is especially the case with Bayern. The fans hold ownership of the Bavarian club, but big companies such as Allianz, Adidas, and Audi have 8.3% of shares in their ownership each. Furthermore, the big Bayern's sponsors are also Qatar Airways and T-Mobile. Therefore, Bayern will always have an advantage over the ones that cannot get such a strong investor and the ones that have to rely on the 50+1 rule.

The majority share of the club given to Hopp done by the book

Let's go back to Hopp. Hopp became the majority owner of Hoffenheim in December 2014 after having invested in the club for more than 20 years. Except for this club, only Bayer Leverkusen and Wolfsburg have the majority ownerships, but Bayer and Volkswagen belong to the clubs from their very beginning.

After he gained the majority of ownership over Hoffenheim, Hopp became even more hated. The insults reached a peak after the German Football Association decided to ban Borussia Dortmund's fans from attending two Hoffenheim matches at home. This decision led to massive insults against Hopp.

Disappointed by the German Football Association's decision, the fans of Borussia M'Gladbach, Bayern and United Berlin lodged protests causing the games to be stopped. Even the players in the match between Hoffenheim and Bayern decided just to pass the ball back and forth and stand on the pitch until the end of the game, which lasted for around 15 minutes. Maybe the players wouldn't act like that if it weren't for Bayern with 6-0 win, but at any rate, their reaction to insults represented a great sign of how much they defend Hopp.

"I won't give up. Why shouldn't I go to the stadium anymore? The people who do this are the ones who should stay away. If I remotely knew what these idiots wanted from me, it would be all the easier for me to understand. I can't explain why they are so hostile towards me. It reminds me of very dark times." said the disappointed Hopp after the game against Bayern. 

The fans' hatred towards Hopp started to be treated as serious as racism, which also sparked controversy because racism is much more serious and should not be put in the same category with insults such as "a son of a bitch" that are directed to Hopp.

Hopp is one of the greatest humanitarians in the world

No matter how these insults are treated and what penalties the fans get, it's weird to be filled with so much hatred towards a man who was awarded different national acclaims in Germany because of his business success as well as his humanitarian actions.

It's even weirder because Hopp did everything by the book - he had been investing in the club for 20 years, then he got the majority ownership, which was done in accordance with the rules. Moreover, he transformed a lower-league team to a club that competes in the Champions League, a club that is less and less dependent on his wealth. 

"Why do I do what I do? Safe environment, education, good health, success, I have it all. That's why I can help others and be a role model for others. I believe that kids can benefit from sports because the team spirit is the most important in sports. Through sports, they learn how to be more decisive and more persistent. Sports connect people. Our academies give opportunities to thousands and thousands of children and young people. That's what keeps me going," said Hopp on one occasion. 

Hopp's life-altering step happened in 1972 when he founded the software company SAP with his colleagues. From 1988-1998 he was the CEO of the company, which became known globally during that period. 

After that, he transferred to the supervisory board until 2005 when he left SAP, keeping around 5.5% of the shares. Since the company is considered the most successful German company after World War II and is currently the most valuable company in Germany, then that percentage is quite enough to possess vast wealth. 

Referees' decisions made him take over a club in the village with a population of only a few thousand people 

Growing up in Hoffenheim, a small village with less than 4000 residents, near a little town of Sinsheim, steered Hopp towards a football club of the same name - Hoffenheim. The story goes that, at the beginning of the 1990s, he started to invest in Hoffenheim, mostly because of referees' wrong decisions.

"He was angry because the wrong referees' decisions took our club into the district league. It influenced his decision to help us," said Peter Hoffman, the current president of Hoffenheim.  

In time, Hoffenheim grew to be the strongest club in its region and entered the third German league at the beginning of the millennia. When he left the SAP, Hopp decided to bring Hoffenheim to Bundesliga and lead it to the very top of German football. 

That's when the hatred towards him started to stir up.

In 2008, the club entered the Bundesliga and finished first in front of Bayern in the first half-season. In that season, the insults had already begun as well as the banners with his face covered with crosshairs of a sniper's rifle.  

The current situation regarding Hopp is specific because he's the man that established the Dietmar Hopp Foundation in 1995 and helped hospitals, retirement homes, kindergartens, and schools. In 2001, as a result of the big economic crisis, he was the only independent investor in the German biotechnology, investing more than 300 million euros at that time.

The Dietmar Hopp Foundation funded expensive apparatuses, such as a modern scanner for magnetic resonance imaging, and supported different projects, such as projects in connection with the development of medicine and medical researches. The invested resources helped, among others, in the elimination of breast cancer and dealing with heart diseases. 

Demonstrating his greatness during coronavirus

All the help that Hopp provided to the vulnerable people would be appreciated much more if he also didn't decide to invest in football, his big passion. But, in football, he realized how thin the line between a hero and a villain truly is. Without football, Hopp would continue to be a multi-billionaire and a philanthropist who helps the world, and with football, he has become the most hated football public figure in Germany. 

Football brought him no wealth at all, nor he entered the football world to earn money. He entered the football world out of love for a local club for which he played as a kid. His intentions to make the club big were interpreted as breaking with the German tradition by which clubs couldn't belong to a single investor. 

Hopp demonstrated his greatness even during coronavirus. His company CureVac has gotten very far in its work on finding the vaccine against coronavirus, and soon it's starting with clinical trials of its effectiveness. In doing so, Hopp rejected American president Donald Trump who wanted to be the only buyer of the vaccine if and when it's proven successful. 

"I want to develop a vaccine for the entire world, not only for one country, certain classes, or parts of the world. If developed and tested successfully, the vaccine will stop to be a matter of assumptions or an electronic tool. It'll serve as a means of overcoming the global crisis, that's what I wish for," said Hopp. 

With his acts, he once again demonstrated that he really wants to be a role model for others and that the world needs people like him, no matter what the ones who stop the games with their excessive behavior think.