Leverkusen axe Toppmoeller

It will be interesting to see how having a former youth coach will affect Donovan's eventual entry into the side.

I am not sure of their history together.

 

By the time Donovan gets back, they probably will have hired and fired 2 coaches.

 

. . . and will have been relegated.

 

if they get relagated the first thing that goes is a player worth 10 Million Pounds who doesn't even play for them....they'll need the money (even if some of it goes to MLS)

 

There is no effect for Donovan if Bayer relegates. Their main sponsor (RWE) hardly cuts money and also Bayer would do everything to make this an accident. According to Nowotny almost no star has contract for 2.Bundesliga, so no real financial need because of that. Also, Bayer has an insurance for the case of relegation, which would have to pay out a major sum. Of course the budget would be much lower (100 M Euro currently), but still you could expect them to be back after one year.

 

The insurance people must be losing it right now.

Not suprised to see Top go, fiery collapses need a scapegoat (or four), and rightly or wrongly Toppmoeller was doomed.

 

Hannover's looking like geniuses now for selling Simak to Leverkusen. If they manage to stay up, they could use that cash to bring in some better players.

 

I really don't think it Toppmoeller's fault. Their key players from last season either were sold or were injured. Shows the price of playing at this elite level.

Also wasn't this a bad time to make the move. They have a Champions league match in only two days.

 

I might be obtuse or something but what I got out of that is that the stars won't play in 2.Bundesliga. Does that mean all the high priced players would leave Bayer Leverkusen? And if they did get relagated, would Leverkusen immediatly attempt to recall Donovan?

 

which would be bad for Connors Casey ):

 

Casey will be going back to Borussia Dortmund after this season AFAIK whether he ends up contributing to Hannover or not. If you recall he signed with Borrussia Dortmund originally, kicked a$$ with their amateur/reserve team, and got loaned to Hannover.

Casey has 1 season left on his contract IIRC, and if he can score some goals with Hannover, Dortmund may give him the chance at some PT next year. If not, he plays out the season and can go to another club. Personally, I'm not that impressed with some of Dortmund's forwards(I think Koeller is quite overrated). If(big if) Casey can develop more with Hannover it wouldn't be out of the question to think that he could see some time with Dortmund next year.

 

Then again, Casey could always pull a Twellman...

 

You mean after his contract his up? Casey is a relatively established scorer in the 2nd Bundesliga and is probably a more known prospect now than he was before. I think in terms of pure $$, he's going to end up getting more money in Europe than he would with MLS. MLS only shells out big bucks to players who they believe are marketable. It likely depends on that for his return to MLS.

 

They tried to get him to come back, but he said no.

 

Alberto: in the end it's always the team that has the fate of the coach in their hands, but Toppmöller's traditional basic mistake is that he is too close to the team in times of success. You could see it last year when he was hugging every player after a won game. This year he did not get the necessary distance to the player in times of lacking success. Also there were elementary mistakes with calling the national players just two (!) weeks before the season start back to the training. This went hand in hand with excuses already before the games throughout the whole year, which gave the players an alibi for bad games. Much more important than the physical requirements were the psychological needs that the team collapsed with a goal against - clear responsibility of a coach. Then he didn't manage to replace Ballack and Ze Roberto - he got his favourite candidates Simak and Franca, both absolutely failed so far (they might be good ones in one or two seasons, but this does not count). And finally despite of all the injury luck there still were about seven or eight players on the pitch, who also played more than 50% of the games in the last season - the quality of the roster always was existing, surely not for a Champions League spot, but definitely to be much better than now. Next aspect would be the horrible defence, which is absolutely overtaxed with simple long balls since weeks - and this with guys like Lucio, Placente, Juan, Ramelow or Cris. And finally until the end he did not realise the situation, spoke about "a little crisis" and things like that. The officials and Toppi always relied on the return of the injured players and the winter break, but they did not see that Toppi lost the contact to the team already before. The right moment for the cut would have been the winter break. Toppi still is a great coach, I'd sign him immediately as an official in need of a new one - but in Leverkusen his time was over.

@appooOnU: the real top players would definitely leave Leverkusen. A World Champion like Lucio does not stay in 2.Bundesliga. Also guys like Ramelow, Schneider or Nowotny would lose all chances to play in the national team if they'd go down with the club. The younger ones would probably stay, also for guys like Simak it would be a great chance. Besides that I believe that Bayer stays in Bundesliga, Donovan would not be recalled as they loaned him for two years and there's no reason to get him back unless Donovan wants to.

The Wanderer: Casey is a different topic, but you can't seriously expect him to make Dortmund's roster if he's having problems to make Hannover's. Koller is indeed the center to beat for him, but Koller is much more important for Dortmund than at least the German media and also the own fans believe. He may have some problems to score, but he's winning every air duel in the midfield and initiating almost every attack of Dortmund with that. Also consider that Casey has no chance against a Fredi Bobic, who hardly made the bench in Dortmund himself. Nobody knows what would happen with a major injury of Koller though as replacement Herrlich is not such a great player.

 

We'll disagree with this but I really think that Koller is just about worthless. For such a big guy I don't think he wins as many headers as he should, I have to disagree with your statement that he wins every air duel in midfield. Using one game as an example (which isn't the best idea but if you want I'll back it up with more), against Auxerre in the Champions league I started counting how many air duels he had after seeing him miss so many in the first 15 minutes, and for the rest of the game he won less than 30% of clear chances, something that can not happen with someone that huge. Not to mention the fact that he just doesn't move. Sorry to have to disagree but I'd love to hear you defend him.

 

I disagree with your assessment of Koller. I just don't think he's all that he's cracked up to be. I also believe that Casey would have already seen more time with Hannover had he not had the injury problems.

 

Koller is 6th among goal scorers with 10 and 6th in the scorer rating with 10+4, that's not too bad. IMO Rosicky is overrated (0+1 in the first half of the season), but Koller underrated.


Back to Leverkusen: Hörster was determined head coach until the end of the season. They are still looking for kind of a sports director to help him in a combination like formerly Daum/Völler. Hörster is known to be a "hard-liner", who puts lots of emphasis on discipline and a tactical scheme. Lots of pros, who were sent down to the reserves, had problems with him as he prefered to not give them playing time rather than having somebody who does not want to play with 100% passion. Hejduk had to experience this last year as he was out of the reserves squad after just one (bad) game. He's coaching the reserves since 2001 (A and B youth before), so I don't think he coached Donovan, but you'll know that better.

 

How is Horster then viewed by the 1st team players? If he makes the team pull themselves up by the bootstraps I think he'll stay, however, in all liklihood I doubt that most of the players will accept the 'disciplinarian' style of managing.

 

No it wasn't.

 

Hörster kept distance to the first team, that's why many don't know him. As usually the discipline style will work as long as the team is deep down and fights against relegation. As soon as they think they are on a safe position, they'll lean back and work against the coach - that's how it is with all so called firemen. For the current situation Calli supports Hörster already very early and emphasises that there won't be a new coach - so, for the players it is only the choice of either with him or watching the games from outside. Lacking discipline already was the reproach of the injured Jens Nowotny in an interview in the winter break, which also was indirect criticism on Toppmöller.

Hörster sees the Newcastle game as possibility to learn more about the team. He'll put emphasis on the defence and sorted out Carsten Ramelow for the matchday roster, who's in a horrible shape at the moment.

 

Thanks for the insight Olaf.

I guess we'll get to really see what Horster can do for the next Bundesliga match, the games that really matter most right now considering our dire position.

Discipline and confidence then sound to be our main problems and not helped is the addition of fitness, or lack there of, and a queue to enter in the treatment room like it was an Oasis concert.

 

let's let the results judge tomorrow sir...with our luck Robson will continue in his senility and confound Newcastle with some trite shite.