In Heidenheim, Fürth’s new coach Alexander Zorniger is still in the stands. There he sees a 1: 3 – and that he still has a lot of work ahead of him. But there is also a reason to be happy in the game.
Heidenheim (dpa / lby) – Alexander Zorniger should save SpVgg Greuther Fürth from falling into the 3rd football league. A few minutes after the 1: 3 (0: 2) in the 2nd Bundesliga at 1. FC Heidenheim, the bottom of the table made a fresh start and announced the commitment of the 55-year-old. The former coach of RB Leipzig and VfB Stuttgart starts on Monday, his contract runs until the summer of 2024.
“Now it’s time to pinch your buttocks and get out of there together,” said managing director Rachid Azzouzi at Sky. “He’s a very experienced coach. He stands for a kind of football, also for intensity, for a certain conviction. That’s what we need now: the conviction that we’ll get out of there.”
Zorniger, who last worked for Apollon Limassol in Cyprus and won the championship there, should get the Bundesliga relegated back on track. The first game is tough: Fürth is expecting second-to-last Arminia Bielefeld on Friday.
“We’ll do everything we can to be successful. In the next few weeks, it’s about familiarizing the team with the high-intensity style of play that I stand for,” said Zorniger.
Before Zorniger’s eyes, the Franconians conceded another defeat in the first game after the separation of the previous coach Marc Schneider. “The team missed everything in the first half,” said Azzouzi on Sky. Patrick Mainka (9th minute) and Tim Kleindienst (33rd) punished this with their goals. “If you concede two or three goals every time, you can’t win a game,” Azzouzi said.
Zorniger also saw a good reaction from his future team after the break and captain Branimir Hrgota made it 2-1 (52′). A hard and questionable penalty decision steered the game back clearly in the direction of the hosts; Jan-Niklas Beste converted safely (56th). “It’s not a penalty,” Azzouzi said. “With a decision like that you kill someone in a situation like that.”
Nice for the people of Fürth, except for the commitment of the new coach: Marco Meyerhöfer celebrated a competitive comeback in front of 8130 spectators in the final phase after suffering a serious ankle injury from his first division days. “We absolutely wanted to take something with us,” said interim coach Rainer Widmayer, who pointed out the disappointing first half. “We defended too naively and then ended up losing out.”
After the 2-2 draw against Rostock on the previous day, Fürth parted ways with Schneider. The management of the team was temporarily entrusted to assistant coach Widmayer, who, together with co-Stefan Kleineheismann, had prepared the team for the game in Heidenheim. You stay on the coaching staff. Jurek Rohrberg is new.
