VfL Bochum: Historically weak start to the season – pressure on Zeidler is increasing

Pressure on Zeidler is increasing

One point after the first seven games – that should seem familiar to VfL Bochum. A yield as meager as in the current season was already recorded at the beginning of the 2022/23 season. The fact that today they have a less poor goal record than back then doesn’t help the new coach Peter Zeidler in the current misery. He and sports director Marc Lettau commented on the situation at Castroper Straße, where there does not seem to be any immediate replacement of the coach at the moment.

“Our performance in the first half was dramatic, we cannot and will not leave it like that,” Lettau was quoted as saying by the “Bild” newspaper on Sunday after the 3-1 defeat at Hoffenheim on Saturday. Given the upcoming program against FC Bayern, Eintracht Frankfurt and champions Leverkusen, the sixth league defeat threatens to be the worst Bundesliga result ever after ten games. In the 22/23 season, when the first seven games were just as poor as in the new championship round, the first three-pointer was achieved on the ninth matchday.

When Bochum finally got their act together two years ago, coach Thomas Letsch had just started his term at the Ruhrpottklub. The fact that Zeidler, who started with a cup defeat against second division relegation candidate Regensburg, could lose his position does not seem to be on the agenda, at least for this weekend. According to “Bild”, the management team meeting on Sunday around sports director Lettau, managing director Ilja Kaenzig and the executive committee around Hans-Peter Villis want to “consciously make the decision difficult”. You rely on cohesion. A quick decision is therefore unlikely – also because Zeidler has supporters in the team who are convinced that the problems lie deeper.

Bochum’s Zeidler combative – These were the worst starts in the Bundesliga

Zeidler himself was combative. “This is a team that lives,” he said after the next setback in the basement duel in Kraichgau. Regarding his shaky future at VfL, he emphasized: “You know that I fully identify with myself, that I am hard-working and also very competent. Otherwise I might have already left.” He hopes that his work in Bochum will continue “for a very long time. The team is also fully committed, he assured. He firmly believes that the points will come at some point.

If the points don’t come soon, the Bochum team may join SpVgg Greuther Fürth and 1. FC Saarbrücken. In 2021 and 1963, they only managed to take one point from the first ten Bundesliga games of a season. In the history of the league, 13 teams have only recorded one point after seven games, as VfL has now, Bochum twice and 1. FC Köln even three times. The 2021 team from Fürth had to wait until matchday 15 to finally get past the first point. Little consolation for VfL.

Whether a change of coach would make any sense in Bochum before the mammoth tasks of Bayern, SGE and Leverkusen – after which they also go to runner-up Stuttgart – is one of the topics of discussion that arose about Zeidler in the TM community. “I’m also in favor of a new coach,” comments TM user and VfL fan “Blue”. “Unfortunately, I don’t see how a new coach can turn things around. If things go normally, we’ll get nothing from the next four games and then end up with one point after eleven games. And then we drive to Augsburg. The mortgage that a new coach will have straight away is too high.”

“Mr. Hahn” replies: There are two options: you bridge the time with an interim solution or use the difficult games as unofficial preparation for the games starting in Augsburg. The new coach can basically only win until then. Nobody expects a single point in the coming weeks. Unfortunately, the last two weeks have been wasted unnecessarily because the ‘hope principle’ was used.” (Join the discussion now!)