Andreas Michelmann will be in on Monday, April 23rd Berlin was re-elected as spokesman for Teamsport Germany. The President of the German Handball Association was unanimously expressed their confidence by the representatives of the German Basketball Association, the Deutscher Eishockey-Bund, the German Football Association and the German Volleyball Association.
The Teamsport Germany initiative, founded in March 2017, is the institutionalized interest group of the five largest German team sports associations, which is actively committed to improving the sporting, political and economic framework conditions for team sports.
In addition to the election of Michelmann, the future strategic direction and positioning of the initiative was on the agenda. Competitive sports reform continues to be an outstanding topic. Here, Teamsport Germany is particularly committed to taking the special features of team sports into account when allocating funding. The need for a comprehensive infrastructure program for sports facilities – both in elite and popular sports – is also the focus of the initiative’s work. In addition, Teamsport Germany will focus on the topic of taxes. Among other things, the interest group will lobby politicians to find uniform regulations for all team sports when it comes to exemption from withholding tax for major international sporting events. In principle, team sports can only fully live up to their social responsibility and role model effect if major tournaments of all team sports take place in Germany and are subject to the same regulations and privileges.
Thomas Willenbacher is new to the interest group team. Since February 1st, the political scientist and former public affairs officer for the Association of Sports Sponsoring Providers has been working as head of the capital city office of the Teamsport Germany initiative.