Dortmund, their cultural reboot and why fan favourite Terzic has replaced Rose
Borussia Dortmund have gone for a cultural reboot by replacing coach Marco Rose after one season with their popular former interim manager Edin Terzic, who vowed to repair the disconnect between the players and supporters.
Terzic is the closest thing the German club have got to Jurgen Klopp since the legendary coach stepped down seven years ago. He is a Dortmunder Junge — a Dortmund boy — and was in tears on Tuesday when he signed to become the permanent manager.
A lifelong Dortmund fan born in Menden, a small city 33km (20 miles) to the east, Terzic has previously worked for the club as a youth coach, scout and assistant manager. His working-class roots — Terzic is the son of “Gastarbeiter” (immigrant workers) who came to Germany from the former Yugoslavia — match those of many Dortmund fans and his preferred style of play is befitting of the heavy metal football Klopp once bestowed on the club.
Of his 32 games in interim charge after Lucien Favre’s sacking in December 2020, Terzic won 20 and lost eight, with Dortmund scoring nearly double (74) the number of goals they conceded (42). They were mistake-ridden at times, but he finished with seven straight league wins and a German Cup final victory over RB Leipzig.
He was popular with his fellow Dortmund supporters. He gets the club.
Terzic’s fan-favourite status with the public meant it always felt as if replacement Rose was fighting an uphill battle.
The club had paid Borussia Monchengladbach €5 million for Rose in what was supposed to be the beginning of a long-term project — and to give Dortmund a new identity with his “modern, attacking, offensive football”.
Just last week, Rose was part of a discussion about how to replace Manchester City-bound Erling Haaland and put forward some names himself. Yet on the Friday, Dortmund made the announcement they were parting ways with the 45-year-old. A source close to the club said it was neither a shock or expected, but “something in between”.
The previous evening, Rose joined chief executive Hans-Joachim Watzke, outgoing sporting director Michael Zorc and successor Sebastian Kehl, who takes over in July, and Dortmund great turned consultant Matthias Sammer for a season-analysis meeting.
When Rose went into that meeting, neither side expected it would result in his departure, but there was enough doubt — especially from Sammer — to suggest bigger changes were afoot.
Instead of addressing the bosses’ questions about how he would fix Dortmund’s problems in 2022-23, Rose tried to make positive arguments, German news outlet Der Spiegel has reported.
Dortmund scored 85 league goals this season — fifth-most in Europe’s top five domestic leagues behind Manchester City, Bayern Munich, Liverpool and Paris Saint-Germain, three of whom played 38 games to their 34. Rose saw the start of a new playing culture. His bosses wanted answers about the number of goals conceded (a middle-of-the-pack 52, one fewer than an Arminia Bielefeld side who got relegated).
Opinions began to diverge.
In the eventual statement, Watzke spoke of “not achieving the maximum in certain areas”, while Rose insisted he was “convinced we were on the right path”.
It was a similar story with other issues.
On injuries, Rose pointed to the make-up of the squad, with lots of young players who are still growing, and lots of older ones. The board wanted more attention placed on training methods.
When Rose asked the question about whether he had the full backing of the board and didn’t get the answer he was anticipating, he felt as if it was over. That was important to him after Kehl had made non-committal comments about Rose’s future ahead of the penultimate game of the season against bottom-side Greuther Furth. Kehl had used the phrase “I assume so”, when asked whether Rose would be head coach next season.
Despite the tricky meeting, they agreed to meet again on the Friday morning to make a final decision. Yet without the 100 per cent backing of the board, Rose felt it was impossible for him to carry on.
There were no personal problems between Rose and anyone either in the squad or on the coaching staff — if anything, it was thought he was too nice to the players. Dortmund were not ultimately convinced he had all the solutions and with a ready-made successor in waiting, it was easier for them to pull the plug.
And so, Dortmund are on to their sixth permanent manager since Klopp’s departure at the end of the 2014-15 season.
Rose will feel he was not given sufficient time to properly implement his more demanding style of football, and he did suffer from a lengthy injury list that included star player Haaland only starting 21 league games.
Add to that the fact that the Leipzig-born coach was hampered by leaving Gladbach at a low point, with them missing out on European qualification, and arrived at Dortmund after Terzic’s cup-winning high and having the 39-year-old’s shadow over him throughout his time in charge. Perhaps he was doomed from the start.
He enjoyed some thumping victories and steered the club back into the Champions League via a second-place finish, but some performances were inexcusably poor.
Those 52 Bundesliga goals allowed were the most in the top eight this season and the most Dortmund have conceded in a league campaign since 2007-08 when they finished 13th in the 18-team division, nine points off relegation.
They were also outclassed in the Champions League, losing half the group games, embarrassed by Scottish champions Rangers after dropping down to the Europa League knockout phase, conceding four times at home in the first leg, and dumped out of the German Cup as holders by second-division side St Pauli.
Dortmund have stumbled rather than strode through the last few years, partly because they have suffered from constantly being compared to perennial domestic top-dogs Bayern but also because, if their choices of coach are anything to go by, they have forgotten who they are.
This appointment of Terzic is the first sign they have remembered.
After getting the job, he told the club’s fans: “Let’s be hungrier than ever. Let’s work harder than ever before. Let us be more positive than ever before. And most importantly, let’s be louder than ever!”
“Edin knows our club, the environment, a large part of the team and the areas we would like to fine-tune to be able to offer successful football to our fans. The 2022-23 season constitutes a fresh sporting start,” Kehl says.
Terzic started his coaching career in Dortmund’s academy between 2010 and 2013 before becoming Slaven Bilic’s assistant at Turkish club Besiktas. He then followed Bilic to Premier League side West Ham in 2015 but left following the Croatian’s sacking in November 2017, re-joining Dortmund as Favre’s assistant the following year.
Following Favre’s sacking midway through 2020-21, Terzic was named interim boss until the end of the season, leading the club to German Cup final glory. He continued to work at the club after Rose’s appointment in a new role as technical director.
Dortmund have already been busy, selling Haaland and signing midfielder Salih Ozcan (Cologne), defenders Nico Schlotterbeck (Freiburg) and Niklas Sule (Bayern), and attacker Karim Adeyemi (Red Bull Salzburg) — giving their fans reason for optimism next season.
And they now have one of their own on the sidelines again.
Their fans will now be hoping Terzic turns out to be the one they have been waiting for since Klopp packed his bags.
https://theathletic.com/3334576/2022/05/27/dortmund-edin-terzic-marco-rose/
Dortmund, their cultural reboot and why fan favourite Terzic has replaced Rose
Borussia Dortmund have gone for a cultural reboot by replacing coach Marco Rose after one season with their popular former interim manager Edin Terzic, who vowed to repair the disconnect between the players and supporters.
Terzic is the closest thing the German club have got to Jurgen Klopp since the legendary coach stepped down seven years ago. He is a Dortmunder Junge — a Dortmund boy — and was in tears on Tuesday when he signed to become the permanent manager.
A lifelong Dortmund fan born in Menden, a small city 33km (20 miles) to the east, Terzic has previously worked for the club as a youth coach, scout and assistant manager. His working-class roots — Terzic is the son of “Gastarbeiter” (immigrant workers) who came to Germany from the former Yugoslavia — match those of many Dortmund fans and his preferred style of play is befitting of the heavy metal football Klopp once bestowed on the club.
Of his 32 games in interim charge after Lucien Favre’s sacking in December 2020, Terzic won 20 and lost eight, with Dortmund scoring nearly double (74) the number of goals they conceded (42). They were mistake-ridden at times, but he finished with seven straight league wins and a German Cup final victory over RB Leipzig.
He was popular with his fellow Dortmund supporters. He gets the club.
Terzic’s fan-favourite status with the public meant it always felt as if replacement Rose was fighting an uphill battle.
The club had paid Borussia Monchengladbach €5 million for Rose in what was supposed to be the beginning of a long-term project — and to give Dortmund a new identity with his “modern, attacking, offensive football”.
Just last week, Rose was part of a discussion about how to replace Manchester City-bound Erling Haaland and put forward some names himself. Yet on the Friday, Dortmund made the announcement they were parting ways with the 45-year-old. A source close to the club said it was neither a shock or expected, but “something in between”.
The previous evening, Rose joined chief executive Hans-Joachim Watzke, outgoing sporting director Michael Zorc and successor Sebastian Kehl, who takes over in July, and Dortmund great turned consultant Matthias Sammer for a season-analysis meeting.
When Rose went into that meeting, neither side expected it would result in his departure, but there was enough doubt — especially from Sammer — to suggest bigger changes were afoot.
Instead of addressing the bosses’ questions about how he would fix Dortmund’s problems in 2022-23, Rose tried to make positive arguments, German news outlet Der Spiegel has reported.
Dortmund scored 85 league goals this season — fifth-most in Europe’s top five domestic leagues behind Manchester City, Bayern Munich, Liverpool and Paris Saint-Germain, three of whom played 38 games to their 34. Rose saw the start of a new playing culture. His bosses wanted answers about the number of goals conceded (a middle-of-the-pack 52, one fewer than an Arminia Bielefeld side who got relegated).
Opinions began to diverge.
In the eventual statement, Watzke spoke of “not achieving the maximum in certain areas”, while Rose insisted he was “convinced we were on the right path”.
It was a similar story with other issues.
On injuries, Rose pointed to the make-up of the squad, with lots of young players who are still growing, and lots of older ones. The board wanted more attention placed on training methods.
When Rose asked the question about whether he had the full backing of the board and didn’t get the answer he was anticipating, he felt as if it was over. That was important to him after Kehl had made non-committal comments about Rose’s future ahead of the penultimate game of the season against bottom-side Greuther Furth. Kehl had used the phrase “I assume so”, when asked whether Rose would be head coach next season.
Despite the tricky meeting, they agreed to meet again on the Friday morning to make a final decision. Yet without the 100 per cent backing of the board, Rose felt it was impossible for him to carry on.
There were no personal problems between Rose and anyone either in the squad or on the coaching staff — if anything, it was thought he was too nice to the players. Dortmund were not ultimately convinced he had all the solutions and with a ready-made successor in waiting, it was easier for them to pull the plug.
And so, Dortmund are on to their sixth permanent manager since Klopp’s departure at the end of the 2014-15 season.
Rose will feel he was not given sufficient time to properly implement his more demanding style of football, and he did suffer from a lengthy injury list that included star player Haaland only starting 21 league games.
Add to that the fact that the Leipzig-born coach was hampered by leaving Gladbach at a low point, with them missing out on European qualification, and arrived at Dortmund after Terzic’s cup-winning high and having the 39-year-old’s shadow over him throughout his time in charge. Perhaps he was doomed from the start.
He enjoyed some thumping victories and steered the club back into the Champions League via a second-place finish, but some performances were inexcusably poor.
Those 52 Bundesliga goals allowed were the most in the top eight this season and the most Dortmund have conceded in a league campaign since 2007-08 when they finished 13th in the 18-team division, nine points off relegation.
They were also outclassed in the Champions League, losing half the group games, embarrassed by Scottish champions Rangers after dropping down to the Europa League knockout phase, conceding four times at home in the first leg, and dumped out of the German Cup as holders by second-division side St Pauli.
Dortmund have stumbled rather than strode through the last few years, partly because they have suffered from constantly being compared to perennial domestic top-dogs Bayern but also because, if their choices of coach are anything to go by, they have forgotten who they are.
This appointment of Terzic is the first sign they have remembered.
After getting the job, he told the club’s fans: “Let’s be hungrier than ever. Let’s work harder than ever before. Let us be more positive than ever before. And most importantly, let’s be louder than ever!”
“Edin knows our club, the environment, a large part of the team and the areas we would like to fine-tune to be able to offer successful football to our fans. The 2022-23 season constitutes a fresh sporting start,” Kehl says.
Terzic started his coaching career in Dortmund’s academy between 2010 and 2013 before becoming Slaven Bilic’s assistant at Turkish club Besiktas. He then followed Bilic to Premier League side West Ham in 2015 but left following the Croatian’s sacking in November 2017, re-joining Dortmund as Favre’s assistant the following year.
Following Favre’s sacking midway through 2020-21, Terzic was named interim boss until the end of the season, leading the club to German Cup final glory. He continued to work at the club after Rose’s appointment in a new role as technical director.
Dortmund have already been busy, selling Haaland and signing midfielder Salih Ozcan (Cologne), defenders Nico Schlotterbeck (Freiburg) and Niklas Sule (Bayern), and attacker Karim Adeyemi (Red Bull Salzburg) — giving their fans reason for optimism next season.
And they now have one of their own on the sidelines again.
Their fans will now be hoping Terzic turns out to be the one they have been waiting for since Klopp packed his bags.
https://theathletic.com/3334576/2022/05/27/dortmund-edin-terzic-marco-rose/
