“We want to end the season with a positive result”

Tobi would have deserved to be in the starting lineup on Sunday and lead the team out as captain in his final game. That’s what we all want. I would have wanted it too. The tragedy of football, however, is that Tobi twisted his ankle in training today. As of now, we can’t say whether he’ll be able to play on Sunday. This is very upsetting for me. We’ll have to wait and see what tomorrow, Saturday, brings.

I’ve known Tobi for 15 years. Back then at Werder, I was still a player myself – and I often had to clear the ball out of the goal against that cheeky guy (grins). I’ve followed his career over the years. Tobi created difference-making moments with incredible consistency. He was with the Lilies for a decade and managed to decide games out of nothing. Some players go through a phase of one or two years where they can do something like that. Tobi, on the other hand, managed it for ten years. In those ten years, he’s been one of the best set-piece takers in the 2nd division. And he can be incredibly proud of his career and the path he’s taken. He’s also an outstanding character. I have the utmost respect for him.

Tobi was a daily advisor to many players this season. He was also an advisor and inspiration to me. Especially in the first half of the season, he was also an important part of the team’s sporting career. I remember the game in Karlsruhe and the cup match in Dresden, in which he provided assists and goals. In this turbulent season, Tobi was also a calming influence. Overall, he was a very important factor.

Sunday is a very important occasion for us. We want to give Tobi the best possible farewell. We are highly motivated to secure this home win, hopefully with him, but above all for him. Overall, the club still has something at stake: We want to maintain our position in the table; that would be very important for us. Of course, we are not at all happy with the results in the second half of the season. Our home game run since Schalke has been positive, and we absolutely want to end the season with a positive result. The way the team performed this week in training and in the last game in Kaiserslautern makes me optimistic that we will do everything we can to win Sunday’s game. I, too, absolutely want to win. After all, a win means you go into the summer break differently. We absolutely want to avoid ending the season with three defeats. That’s why we are very combative.

They played a good home game against KSC. They play with a back three and press very hard man-to-man. They also try to bridge the midfield with lots of crosses. They have the players for that. It’s very difficult to win back the ball against teams that put a lot of players on the back line. The first leg was by far the worst game of the season under my leadership. I watched it again this week. We weren’t able to find solutions against them there. Their style of play hasn’t changed dramatically compared to the first half of the season.

I believe we need to take a very differentiated view of the current season. After the Elversberg game in the first half of the season, there were newspaper headlines like „Now it’s just a matter of survival“ or „A second relegation in a row is looming.“ As the sporting management, we were tasked with developing a game plan and getting through the season on a stable basis, which would also develop players. Player development wasn’t just about sporting issues, but also about the team structure and leadership responsibility. To go through the tasks and goals step by step: We developed a game plan, but it reached its limits in certain games. We need to evolve and find other solutions. Nevertheless, the Lilies stand for a certain style of football, and we want to further consolidate that. Many players have developed athletically. Have we also managed to develop a structure within the team? Not really. With the exception of Marcel Schuhen, Aleksandar Vukotic, and Clemens Riedel, none of the players who were supposed to form a core team were consistently available. So we need to significantly increase player availability in order to be able to train the axis.

I have enormous confidence in Paul Fernie. He has put together the squad extremely well. The injury woes this season – we were without twelve players in Kaiserslautern as well – have prevented the depth of the team from being utilised. If we draw the right conclusions and manage to find the right profiles in one place or another, then I am very optimistic that we can be more successful in terms of results in our second year. I see many indicators that we can have a significantly more successful season next year. This is not a declaration of war, nor is it a formulation of goals for the season. This is a realistic assessment.

We, as a team and coaching staff, know that it hasn’t been the greatest season for a Lilien fan. Nevertheless, I noticed throughout the season that the city recognised how hard the team worked and played with passion – even if it wasn’t always successful. I would be delighted if we could all come together again on Sunday to create that Bölle atmosphere. Not just for Tobi, but for all of us. One crucial factor we have here at Darmstadt 98: the close bond between the team and the fans. Thank you very much for that.