As expected, the revolution failed to materialize. Werder Bremen has no personnel consequences for the catastrophe season with the fast relegation. Instead, coach Florian Kohfeldt is supposed to stabilize the Bremen team who crashed so badly this season and remain the face of the green-whites. Sport Managing Director Frank Baumann also remains in office. Whether the duo will be provided with a kind of team manager, such as Sebastian Kehl in Dortmund, is yet to be discussed.
Basically, however, the credo on the Weser is: keep it up in terms of staff, other ways of executing it. “Werder must remain Werder – with all willingness to improve,” said supervisory board boss Marco Bode on Friday.
Florian Kohfeldt thanks you for the trust
Even during the sporting and dramatic season with the rescue only in the relegation against the second division club 1. FC Heidenheim, those responsible had opposed the customs of the industry. Despite public pressure from numerous ex-professionals, they clung to Kohfeldt. “Why should we disagree now – where we did it,” Bode repeated his commitment to the 37-year-old coach.
Kohfeldt appreciates his special standing on the Weser. “I have to thank all of the people who sit here, who have backed me up internally and externally and who have always been convinced of me,” said the Werder coach in the Bremen media room to the managing directors and supervisory board boss Bode sitting next to him. His affinity with the club is known. “I couldn’t have forgiven myself for relegation,” said Kohfeldt.
The former whiz kid of the German coaching industry admitted mistakes in the past season self-critically. Kohfeldt especially chalked up the wrong training control and the resulting huge misery. “That can’t happen to me again,” said Kohfeldt. “I was driven by the ambition to raise the team to a different athletic level. The team was not ready for it. The mistake was mine,” said Kohfeldt. He had been associated with Hoffenheim in 1899, but said he hadn’t spoken to any other club.
The face of the team will change
In preparation for the new season beginning on September 18, things are now going to go differently. There should also be changes in the coaching staff and in the team around the team that could also affect Kohfeldt’s previous assistant coaches Tim Borowski, Ilia Gruev and Thomas Horsch.
Above all, the face of the team will change. Firstly, because many players disappointed. Above all, however, because Werder needs money from player sales, especially because of the consequences of the corona crisis. In addition to Milot Rashica, who is about to move to RB Leipzig, other top performers such as Davy Klaassen could therefore leave the club. The Werder bosses made it clear that nobody was for sale. The managing director responsible for finance, Klaus Filbry, put the financial damage for the past and new season at around 30 million euros in total.
Last summer, Werder brought mainly seasoned professionals such as Niclas Füllkrug or Ömer Toprak, in the future they will be back on young and viable players. “It will be a new way, which contains the content of the old one. There will be more development,” said Kohfeldt, making it clear that after two weeks of vacation he wants to start again. “I really feel like it and a lot of energy to go this way.”
