Bundesliga
Wolfsburg part ways with Niko Kovač
Wolfsburg have decided to relieve coach Niko Kovač of his duties following the team's 3-1 home defeat to Augsburg.
The Croatian, who is a Bundesliga winner from his time in charge of Bayern Munich, was appointed head coach in May 2022 and led Die Wölfe to an eighth-place finish in the 2022/23 campaign. They narrowly missed out on qualification for the UEFA Conference League following a final-day defeat to already-relegated Hertha Berlin.
Wolfsburg started this season positively, winning three of their opening four matches. However, a run of 11 Bundesliga games without a win has seen them drop down to 14th place in the standings. For the first time in the club's history, the Wolves have failed to triumph in any of their opening ten top-flight matches of a calendar year.
“In our internal review of the defeat against Augsburg and the overall situation, we came to the decision to end our collaboration,” Wolfsburg managing director Marcel Schäfer explained of the decision. “We regret this development but regard it as necessary to give the team a new impulse, in order to stabilise the situation. We’d like to express our thanks to Niko Kovač, his brother Robert as well as Aaron Briggs, and wish them all the best in their personal and professional lives.”
"I as head coach am particularly disappointed that we haven’t managed to turn things around, despite some promising signs. We wish the team, the whole club and its fans all the best for the rest of this season and beyond,” Kovač said, in quotes appearing on Wolfsburg's official website.
The side from Lower-Saxony face a trip to play Werder Bremen after the international break.