Erik Ten Hag has to go after two games

Runner -up

After only two match days: Leverkusen fires head coach

As the successor to Xabi Alonso, Erik Ten Hag was to keep the runner -up Bayer Leverkusen on course. But after only two Bundesliga match days it is over.

Bayer Leverkusen separated from head coach Erik Ten HAG. The Doubles winner from 2024 officially announced this on Monday afternoon. Previously, the transfer journalist Fabrizio Romano and the TV broadcaster Sky had already reported. Ten HAG had only started the office in Leverkusen in the summer, but now has to go again after a DFB Cup game and two games in the Bundesliga.

Managing Director Sport Simon Rolfes said: “This decision was not easy for us. Nobody wished for this step.” The past few weeks, however, have shown that building a new team could not succeed in the current line -up. “We firmly believe in the quality of our team and will now do everything we can to take the next steps in development in a new constellation,” said Rolfes.

For the time being, the assistance trainer staff will take over the team’s training.

Fernando Carro, chairman of the management, also spoke up: “A separation at this early date of the season is painful, but in our view it was necessary. Our claim is still to achieve the goals of the season – this requires the best possible conditions, at all levels and throughout the license area.” Now it is about using that condition completely.

According to reports, the disappointing results against Hoffenheim (1: 2) and Bremen (3: 3 after a 3: 1 lead in the majority) were only part of the cause of the decision against ten HAG. According to a report by the “kicker”, there are said to have been tensions before the game in Bremen last Saturday. Both between trainers and management as well as between coaches and players.

This then culminated in Bremen in the dispute between two players for a penalty. Both Patrik Schick and Exequiel Palacios wanted to shoot, in the end Schick prevailed and hit. Nevertheless, the scene left some traces in the team, it said. Captain Robert Andrich criticized after the game: “Everyone played for themselves, everyone ran around alone on the pitch.” Sentences that do not stand for an intact relationship between team and trainer.

After the game, the club bosses then avoided a statement on the Sky microphone that ten HAG could have been backed. After only two months, the term of the 55-year-old, who previously worked for Manchester United and Ajax Amsterdam, is over.