Julian “nail man” Nagelsmann talks Thomas Müller and toenails

One of the more endearing qualities of the German language is the etymological transparency of a great many personal names that are in common use. That goes well beyond “millers and smiths.” Enter our own Thomas Müller, who made Julian Nagelsmann’s name the butt of a self-deprecating Instagram post about his rather, shall we say, battered toenails.

“I probably need to urgently see Nagelsmann,” Müller wrote—the joke being, of course, that the name ”Nagelsmann” literally means “nail man.”

TZ’s Philipp Kessler caught up with the nail man himself and shared the coach’s response on Twitter. It turns out that, by his own admission, Nagelsmann is not, so to speak, a very skilled nail man. He said:

I think it’s really cool that he posts that. It’s one of his great strengths that he can laugh about himself. We have a pedicurist at the club who is very skilled. One of my weaknesses in particular is cutting toenails. After a bit of jogging, mine look like that too, because I cut the edges down too far. But we have a pedicurist who can do that much better than I can.

Good to know that Thomas can visit an official FC Bayern pedicurist, although frankly he has not left her much to work with.