Valverde successor
©IMAGO
The deal that has been in the works for weeks has now been officially announced: Edin Terzic will be the new coach of Athletic Bilbao. Next season, the 43-year-old will succeed club legend Ernesto Valverde, who announced his departure in the summer in March. Terzic has a contract with Zurigorriak until 2028 and is following in Jupp Heynckes’ footsteps.
The coaching legend was the only German on the Bilbao bench so far – twice. Heynckes managed Athletic for two seasons each from 1992 to 1994 and from 2001 to 2003. The now 80-year-old scored an average of 1.5 points in a total of 160 games, and in LaLiga he always finished in the table region five to nine. In the summer of 2003 he was succeeded by the soon-to-depart Valverde.
His successor Terzic will only be officially introduced after the end of the season. The reason for this is that the club initially wants to continue to focus entirely on sport. Bilbao is in the middle of the battle for Europe. As eighth in the table with 44 points, Athletic is level on points with Getafe in seventh place in the Conference League. Only three points are missing from the Europa League. Still waiting in the final stretch of the season are FC Valencia, Espanyol Barcelona, Celta Vigo and Real Madrid.
Former BVB coach Terzic took time off from Athletic Bilbao
Terzic initially took some time off after leaving Borussia Dortmund. Bilbao will only be his second stop as head coach. Terzic coached the black and yellow from December 2020 to June 2021 and from July 2022 to June 2024. In total, he sat on the BVB bench in 128 games, won the DFB Cup in 2021, almost became German champions in 2023 and led the club to the final of the Champions League in 2024. In 91 games in the Bundesliga he scored an average of 1.97 points – only five coaches in history have been better. After his departure from BVB, Terzic was linked to various clubs, including Juventus, Tottenham, Monaco and Leverkusen.
Valverde’s third term in Bilbao ends in the summer after four years. The 62-year-old Spaniard previously coached the Basques from 2003 to 2005 and from 2013 to 2017. In total, he currently has exactly 500 games with a points average of 1.61. In 2024 he won the Copa del Rey with Athletic for the first time in 40 years.
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