Almost no exceptions: the coach is the weakest link

It is almost time. Christmas is coming and with it the so-called contemplative time that is supposed to put a stop to our constantly hectic world. But the calm is deceptive, indeed it is fake. Anyone who does not meet the requirements and does not deliver the necessary results immediately, but really immediately, in sports, for example, has to leave. The most famous carousel in the world, the one in which the coaches of many teams become the pawns of unpredictable forces, has once again claimed its first victims. And it has met prominent and lesser-known trainers. HC Pustertal, for example, took its coach Luciano Basile on leave a good month ago. Leave of absence. Actually a bad word, because it is nothing other than the most elegant way of expressing an immediate dismissal. They then thank you for the great and self-sacrificing work, which in itself is an impudence because it also makes it clear how helpless the club's management was in this situation. Because Basile was essentially a victim. Ultimately, what was lacking was the quality in his squad.

This is no different in a much more prominent place. At Hertha in Berlin, for example, Pal Dardai had to leave. Yet again. He was already a coach there, at least four years, before he went back to the second level to train the Berlin juniors. In January of this year he stepped in when the Berliners released Bruno Labbadia. And now he has become a victim again like Basile, because the Berliners have not managed to convert the more than 300 million euros that an investor made available to them into a competitive squad. Dardai is not responsible for this, but the sports director. But no one questions Fredi Bobic, who hired Dardai and has now fired him. Anyone who speaks of a clear failure in the club's management is not wrong. Many bad decisions ultimately led to the coach being fired because the coach, and this is nothing new, is actually the weakest link in the chain. After all, it's difficult to replace the team.

Pal Dardai recently had to pack his bags at Hertha BSC Berlin. © ANSA / CLEMENS BILAN

The behavioral patterns are always the same. The Dutchman Roland Koeman was also fired in Barcelona. A few weak games, a mediocre place in the table instead of the lead and the job is gone. Jupp Heynckes was “released” from FC Bayern in October 1991. That's what it was called at the time. The Munich team had lost four games in a row and were only in 12th place in the table. Uli Hoeneß, manager at the time, later described this dismissal as his biggest mistake. Heynckes came back as a coach a seemingly footballing life later when the need was great again and won the coveted treble with the Munich team. At that time, Hoeneß perhaps still lacked the experience and probably also the patience, which is always associated with hope, to continue with Heynckes despite the difficult situation.

In Leipzig, Jesse Marsch has now received the blue letter after three lost games. He is supposedly even a close friend of CEO Oliver Mintzlaff, who, by the way, hired him. Marsch was previously at RB Salzburg and was therefore already part of the football empire of an Austrian shower manufacturer. And it also became clear with the Saxons that the departures before this season, especially that of coach Julian Nagelsmann, who went to FC Bayern, were not replaced with the same quality. Marsch, who was fired during a Corona quarantine, is also a victim. Christian Streich as an exception The decision makers always remain and their mistakes have no impact on them personally. People also like to talk about the breath of fresh air that the new trainers bring, just as if the trainers who were fired were all incompetent. It's almost comforting that there are other examples too. Admittedly few, but they do exist.

For me, FC Freiburg, who just celebrated their biggest Bundesliga win with a 6-0 win in Mönchengladbach, is an outstanding role model for how they deal with their coach Christian Streich. He was even allowed to be relegated to the second Bundesliga. He was kept. He got promoted again, even played in the European Cup and has long since given up the image of the ever-possible relegation. The anniversary is coming up in January next year: Streich will then be coach in Freiburg for exactly ten years without interruption. By the way, the Breisgauer team are currently in fourth place in the Bundesliga, which would ultimately mean qualification for the Champions League. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this place can be kept, because Freiburg is almost a revolutionary alternative to the usual hectic pace in many other clubs.

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Almost no exceptions: the coach is the weakest link

Shortly before Christmas, many clubs become hectic. In many places, club management is losing patience with coaches who have lost a few games. Our columnist Sigi Heinrich also found a great example of how, with patience and foresight, you can avoid layoffs and still stay on the road to success.

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