After just over four months in office, coach Jens Härtel must already give up his post at Eintracht Braunschweig. The last-place team in the 2nd Football Bundesliga parted ways with the 54-year-old and his assistant Ronny Thielemann on Monday after just ten games of the season. "The sporting situation is extremely worrying for all of us. There is an urgent need for action," president Nicole Kumpis was quoted as saying in the club's statement. On Friday, the team had lost 0:3 at promoted SV Elversberg. Of eleven competitive games, including the Cup, Eintracht won only one.
Marc Pfitzner, the previous co-trainer and coach of the U23 team, will take over as an interim solution in the upcoming games against Fortuna Dusseldorf on Friday (18.30 clock/Sky) and in the Lower Saxony derby at Hannover 96 the following week. Pfitzner expressed his gratitude for the trust placed in him. "For me as a Braunschweiger, it is natural to help our Eintracht in this sporting challenging situation," the 39-year-old was quoted.
The sporting leadership of the club had almost no other choice in view of the performances. In the second division, the Braunschweig team has so far scored only five points, the fewest in the league. So far, they have scored only six goals. Especially on the offensive, there was no recognizable game idea under the new coach. Also Härtel had appeared helpless after the weak conception in Elversberg.
After successful stations with the 1. FC Magdeburg and Hansa Rostock Härtel had taken over the Braunschweiger only before this season as successors of Michael squints. But the hoped-for sporting further development, which the supervisory board and management no longer trusted the promotion coach Schiele, failed to materialize under the successor.
"After the clear defeat in Elversberg - especially considering how this came about - we were no longer convinced, however, to create the turnaround in this constellation," said sports managing director Peter Vollmann.
Even more than Härtel, however, Vollmann is criticized by the fans. The club could not compensate for the departures of Immanuel Pherai (Hamburger SV) and Filip Benkovic (Trabzonspor). The serious shoulder injury to goalkeeper Anthony Ujah recently exacerbated the quality problem. Of the eleven new arrivals of the summer so far only the Finnish international Robert Ivanov proved with cutbacks as a reinforcement.
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