The man who gave the club an injection of funds to determine the direction was the owner, Dietmar Hopp. The man in charge of all the specific affairs was the middle-aged Rotthaus, who was the Chief Executive Officer of the TSG 1899 Hoffenheim club.
Rotthaus used to be the head of marketing at the Bundesliga elite squad, VfB Stuttgart. He resigned from Stuttgart in 2005 and accepted Hopp's offer to move to a small team that was still in the 3. Liga tournament at the time. It actually took some courage to make such a choice. After all, he had done well in Stuttgart and had a satisfactory income. There did not seem to be a need to change places and start from scratch. He could get stuck in a quagmire going to a small team in 3. Liga if he was not careful. After months of deliberation, he decided to come to Hoffenheim to make something out of it.
