BORUSSIA DORTMUND HAVE announced that they have sacked head coach Peter Bosz after less than six months in charge, replacing him with former Cologne boss Peter Stoger.
The 54-year-old Dutchman arrived in the summer as the long-term replacement for Thomas Tuchel at BVB, having enjoyed terrific success with an Ajax side he led to the final of the Europa League last season.
However, things have not passed nearly so smoothly in Germany, and Saturday’s 2-1 home defeat against Werder Bremen, which has left Dortmund seventh in the Bundesliga standings, 13 points behind leaders Bayern Munich, was the final straw.
Stoger has now been appointed as Bosz’s replacement for the rest of the season, despite being sacked by Cologne just seven days ago. The 51-year-old spent four seasons in Cologne, helping the club to qualify for Europe for the first time in 25 years. However, he left them at the bottom of the Bundesliga without a single win in their 14 games this season.
Bosz has overseen Dortmund’s worst run in 17 years, with no victories in their last eight Bundesliga outings, dating back to a 2-1 success over Augsburg, which was their sixth win in their first seven league matches. In all competitions, they are winless in nine since a DFB Pokal fixture against FC Magdeburg on 24 October.
It was the fifth time BVB had been defeated in the league this season, and while they are joint top scorers, having netted 35 times in only 15 outings, their record of having conceded 23 times is one of the poorest in the league.
In the Champions League they fared no better, finishing third in a group that contained Real Madrid, Tottenham and APOEL Nicosia. They finished without a single victory, moving into the Europa League after Christmas only by virtue of the fact they had a better goal difference than the Cypriots, against whom they had twice drawn 1-1.
Great to have players like McCloskey step up when called upon. Conan too, both were good tonight for players with not much game time so far.
Henderson justified his starting berth. Hard to know if he or Ryan will start next week.
@Joe O’Regan: henderson won me over last 2 games being brillent james ryan is my fave irish player but hendo will start
@Joe O’Regan: I’m backing my lip reading skills and saying Ryan has broken his hand and will be out.
@Henry Bourke: yeah he looked very uncomfortable after the game , I think Baird takes his spot on the bench
Great to see Crowley showing his class, tried a bit hard perhaps but otherwise what a talent
@William O’Gorman: strikes me as a player that starts slowly and then ramps up quick , he felt his way into the game and was finishing it very strong , the cross field kick was a beauty
@William O’Gorman: Cross field kick was class. He offers more than Byrne definitely but Johnny is still the only man we won’t win the world cup without.
How schoeman wasn’t given a red!!!
Phenomenal – our defence as good as our attack. Hopefully no major injuries for next week.
@Daithi Mc Ghiollamhairtin: agree 100 percent they love to defend
My Gawd what a team,and they are getting better
Outstanding from ireland they love to defend and the attack is amazing bring on new zealand im very confident
Thought Ireland were fantastic as usual in defense and when stretching Scotland out wide punished them in attack. For all the talk from Scotland, that was disappointing. No directness in back play or power going forward , seemed to throw the ball backwards and be pushed back more often than not rather that taking Ireland on directly more in back play.. … Finn was also disappointing… Just seemed to be going through the motions chucking the ball around (no clever chips or anything to get over the gain line) , overall a hiding from ireland and game finished at half time. Next week is a different kettle of fish for Ireland and SA… Now the WC really starts…
@Stuart: Irelands tactic to deal with Russell was to give him as much time as he wanted , they just read his passes and turned over the receiver, Russell seemed to get more and more agitated and made no impact – he is incredibly overrated
Wonder what the SA water boy thought of that performance, not to mention Nienabar’s conspiracy theory! And he’s coming to Ireland next season???
Let’s leave the nonsense to Boks supporters! Nienabar got asked a loaded question about the fix and answered that he didn’t think Irl or Scot would stoop to that!
Looks like Lowe has a scratch on his eye,how long does that take to recover?
@Rugbyanbeer: 2-3 days , he’ll be fine
Hopefully Murray Kinsella and the 42 will finally accept that we have a world class team without bigging up the opposition for click bait reaction.