Borussia Dortmund is in second place in the table. But shortly before his second year of contract as BVB coach, Niko Kovac can no longer just claim to have stabilized the club. Fans and those around them want more. The 53-year-old now clearly dislikes this.
The announcements are short and sweet. “Men, pull harder!”, “It has to be faster!”, “Concentrate, men!” In the first training sessions of the year in Marbella, Spain, Niko Kovac makes it clear what is important at Borussia Dortmund. The BVB coach tightens the reins.
Second place at the turn of the year and seven points more than at the same time last year – all well and good. Although Kovac stabilized BVB in his first eleven months as head coach and led BVB back into the circle of the two or three top national teams behind FC Bayern, there has recently been dissatisfaction in the demanding and difficult environment in Westphalia.
“We had a few games where we conceded goals in the last seconds and then left points behind,” noted national defender Waldemar Anton during the training camp.
Too many draws, too little spectacle – dissatisfaction at BVB is growing
In the Bundesliga alone there were three games (1:1 at HSV, 3:3 against Stuttgart, 1:1 in Freiburg) in which Dortmund lost a total of six points. The gap to Bayern could easily be just three points instead of a whopping nine points before the Bundesliga restart at the weekend. In the Champions League there were two more wasted victories against Juventus Turin (4:4) and Bodö/Glimt (2:2).
References to this have been annoying Kovac recently. For a long time, Nuri Sahin’s successor relied on getting BVB back on track. The fact that the 54-year-old secured the Champions League millions with a final spurt last season and saved the club from a serious problem was rewarded with a surprisingly early contract extension.
“Since April, in the last nine months we have only lost in Barcelona, against Real Madrid at the Club World Cup, in Munich, at Manchester City and against Leverkusen,” said sports director Lars Ricken recently in “Kicker”: “Niko has earned trust. We want to build something with him and continue to improve the team together with him.”
And therein lies the rub. Westphalian football is rarely spectacular; Ricken himself spoke of “pragmatic” football. And this is met with criticism from the fans, to which Kovac reacts increasingly thin-skinned. Having recovered somewhat over the holidays, he now admitted that “there are one point or two where there is still room for improvement.” This is now being worked on in Marbella. The second and third units on the Costa del Sol were already secret.
BVB football should no longer be just pragmatic
Like a prayer wheel, Kovac refers to where BVB stood before him and where it is now. But he also names the construction sites. “We are not dissatisfied with the status quo. But as a coach you always want to improve,” said Kovac in Marbella. “We have to take better advantage of our chances. It’s about taking the ball with us and things like that.” Anton mentioned “tactical things, perhaps standards” and generally “some issues that we need to work on”.
Already on Friday (8.30 p.m., in the WELT sports ticker), the Dortmund team will be challenged again in the Bundesliga against Eintracht Frankfurt. In February, Kovac starts his second year as BVB coach and he notices that the fans want more: spectacle, exciting offensive football and, in the long term, titles again.
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In addition to the increased demands, there are secondary theaters of war that annoy Kovac. Indiscipline among his stars, persistent rumors of transfers about Nico Schlotterbeck, debates about contract extensions for captain Emre Can, Julian Brandt and Karim Adeyemi are putting a strain on the climate. Kovac subliminally passed the pressure on to sports director Sebastian Kehl.
“That’s his job,” said the coach about the talks with Adeyemi and Schlotterbeck, whose contracts are valid until 2027 and should be kept. “I am convinced that he will give it his all.”
Kehl has already taken on an unpleasant task for the coach in Marbella. Together with sports director Lars Ricken, he sentenced Adeyemi to a five-figure fine for his outburst after being substituted early in the 2-0 win against Borussia Mönchengladbach shortly before Christmas. “According to information from “Bild” it should probably be 90,000 euros. Kovac would like to avoid topics like this in the new year.
pk/dpa
