“Didn’t fit at all”
© Imago
Mark van Bommel’s Bundesliga trainer career ended in VfL Wolfsburg in 2021 after less than four months. In the memory, the Dutch remained especially for his exchange faux pas in the first round of the DFB Cup, which cost the Lower Saxony the progress. The ex-professional does not establish the fact that it did not go on for him after only 13 games.
“I didn’t fail on the Bundesliga. Not even to Wolfsburg. Only one person,” said van Bommel in the podcast “playmaker – football from all sides” from 360Media. When asked, the 48-year-old affirmed that he means the then managing director Jörg Schmadtke. “It didn’t fit at all. Not from the beginning.”
The now 61-year-old had already worked for VfL for three years and stayed until January 2023. During his four and a half years in the club, Bruno Labbadia, Oliver Glasner, Van Bommel, interim coach Michael Frontzeck, Florian Kohfeldt and Niko Kovac on the bench. After Glasner, who led the club to the Champions League in 2020/21, none of the successors came to a point cut of over 1.4.
The Schmadtke referred to from the Dutch at the time as a “defeat for everyone, not only for the coach, but in the case for me because I connected different things with the commitment Mark Van Bommel. For me, this is a sad moment and not a nice situation because it is also an admission that you have made a mistake.”
In retrospect, van Bommel mainly criticizes the lack of consistency in the club. “You have to have peace to work and not always feel that you are under pressure. This is the most important thing in football for a coach – don’t worry if you lose a game.” Since his end at the Royal Antwerp FC last summer he has been without a club and can imagine a comeback in Germany: “I still feel like the Bundesliga.”