Great hopes rest on Edin Terzic in his second term as head coach of Borussia Dortmund. It remains to be seen whether he can meet BVB’s expectations. His current mission is more difficult than in the second half of 2020/2021.
Officially, Edin Terzic was technical director at Borussia Dortmund last year, a position that was created last summer especially for the much-acclaimed and advertised ex-interim coach. Actually, the 39-year-old was a shadow man.
Whenever things didn’t go well at BVB under Marco Rose, and that was often the case in an all in all disappointing season, the name Terzic haunted the media and environment.
“Explosive mixture” at BVB
It was an “explosive mixture”, judged Honorary President Uli Hoeneß from FC Bayern in an RTL / ntv interview. Watzke knew that too.
The fact that Rose last week after the season analysis with the Dortmund “elephant round” – i.e. managing director Hans-Joachim Watzke, the outgoing sports director Michael Zorc, his successor Sebastian Kehl and advisor Matthias Sammer – had to resign and was replaced by Terzic, was “not surprising” for him, according to Hoeneß.
At BVB, Terzic now has high hopes. The new head coach not only knows the club, the environment and a large part of the team, but also “knows about the adjustments we want to make in order to be able to offer our fans successful football,” said Kehl.
“Half-dead” BVB by Edin Terzic “brought to life”
Terzic himself set this high bar in his first interlude on the BVB bank from December 2020 as interim successor to Lucien Favre.
After a rocky start, Borussia won the last seven Bundesliga games under his direction and thus made it into the Champions League as third in the table. In addition, a brilliant 4-1 final win against RB Leipzig in the DFB Cup was the first major title win since 2017.
The team was “half dead” at the time of the separation from Favre, Watzke stated at the end of the season on “Sky”. Terzic “brought her to life”.
BVB is missing important success factors
However, the Sauerland native is now missing two of the most important sporting success factors from back then, which carried BVB with their individual class in less strong phases: Jadon Sancho and Erling Haaland.
Sancho left Borussia for Manchester United in 2020. Haaland is moving to Manchester City next season.
In the offensive area, Terzic will instead work with new signing Karim Adeyemi, who has great talent but no experience in a top league, and Mister X in the central attack. Because BVB has not (yet) committed a successor to Haaland.
Many construction sites for Edin Terzic at BVB
Terzic’s abilities as a motivator with a black and yellow heart are undisputed. However, he still has to prove that he can be successful in the long term.
As a reminder: Before his first term in Dortmund, Terzic had never worked as a head coach in the professional field. Now he has a three-year contract with BVB.
And the construction sites are big. The team under Rose conceded 52 goals in the past Bundesliga season – far too many for their own claims.
Stabilizing the defense overall and integrating the new signings Niklas Süle and Nico Schlotterbeck in central defence, for whom he is also responsible as technical director, as well as Salih Özcan in defensive midfield, these are definitely tricky tasks for Terzic.
He will also have to fill the Haaland vacuum. In 2021/2022, “only” 22 of the 85 goals in the league went to the Norwegian due to his numerous injuries. In games without Haaland, however, BVB often presented itself sluggishly and uninspired in the offensive game.
BVB: “Great support from the fans” for Edin Terzic
After all, the Terzic obligation counteracts the worrying alienation from their own supporters for the time being. The old acquaintance on the sidelines will “have great support from the fans,” predicted Uli Hoeneß.
Images like the one after the bitter 3:4 home defeat against VfL Bochum, when the BVB stars were loudly booed and even verbally abused by their own fans, should be a thing of the past in Dortmund – at least for the time being.
Because Terzic will also have to deliver results in order to prevent emerging unrest in the long term. There is no shadow man at BVB this time, which is good news for the new coach.
Tobias Knoop