And you thought it’d never happen

.. but the VfL has eventually announced a new coach. (or was it “..but the Bochum offside is posting again”). Today, Heiko Herrlich has been appointed as new head coach, coming along is his assistant Iraklis Metaxas (who is already causing my keyboard some headache).

our new coach

Herrlich was already appointed as Germany’s Under-19s national team (a post he inherited from the uber-successful Horst Hrubesch) in order to lead a generation to success which he already new from two years age, when he led then seventeen year-olds to a third place in the world cup. In any case, he has accepted Bochum’s offer now, and put aside national duty for the moment. The whole appointment is interesting in several aspects: Herrlich’s name wasn’t mentioned at all in the rumour columns until about yesterday. Plus, the official statement explicitly stresses the chance to use his experience with youth teams to closely link the Bochum youth teams with the first team – which I believe is the way to go for the club, and should have been for quite a while. Maybe, finally, they have understood that there is more substance in strengthening your own youth instead of buying 35 year old half-successful strikers (I am looking at you, Diego Klimowicz – though I must admit he isn’t any worse than the rest this season). And it comes much cheaper, too.

Some words about the new coach: from his playing days at Borussias Dortmund and Mönchengladbach I recall Herrlich as a personable chap who came across as modest and intelligent. During his career with Dortmund, for a while it looked like he was filling the “score-great-headers-in-important-matches” role Riedle had invented before him. However, in 2000, a brain tumor threatened to end his career too early. He fought the cancer, and after about one year of therapy he was recovered and re-started his career with Dortmund – who, if I am not mistaken, kept his contract during this phase. He returned to professional football in 2001, and continued to play until 2004, although he never again reached the height of his game.
Arguably his most famous moment was getting attacked by Olli Kahn in a rather ugly match between Dortmund and Bayern in 1999 (see below). The media said that Kahn bit Herrlich, but looking at the photograph “affection” seems the close cousin of “aggression”, doesn’t it?

Woof, woof!

One last word on this story: only this sunday, an anonymous bloke dropped some information on a radio and TV show that Jörn Andersen was definitely going to the next Bochum coach, and it would most likely be announced on Tuesday. Well, 50% correct. Close, but no cigar, I’d say.

Category: Team News