Lessons learned and accomplishments from this season

Conclusions from this season and a look ahead from Florian Kohfeldt
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Head coach Florian Kohfeldt is happy to have achieved many of the team’s aims this season. (Photo: nordphoto).
First Team
Wednesday, 22.05.2019 / 16:01

The season is over, and the team have taken off for a well-deserved vacation. Only Florian Kohfeldt and his assistant coaches remain in the coach’s office. The motto for the last week of work before the summer break is: analyze the season. The head coach spoke with WERDER.DE about the 39 games this season, the goals that were met, missed chances, the night Werder’s DFB-Pokal dreams ended, the points total, planning the lineup and the upcoming pre-season.

Florian Kohfeldt on…

…this season’s aim of “doing business internationally”: “Overall, this season was a good one. We’re not entirely happy, however, since we wanted to play for Europe. We set that goal for ourselves and were clear that that was what we wanted to do. I would have liked to have started the season at the end of July. As a result, there was a bit of a sense of disappointment on Sunday that we finished eighth, and not in sixth or seventh.”

Florian Kohfeldt is thankful for the fans' support this season (Photo: Heidmann).

...three goals that were met: “We came up with plenty of other goals for this season, some of which failed to appear. We exceeded them in some regards. The first big part of our work was implementing a winning mentality within the club and the team. The team did a really great job of implementing that. They never gave up and never let themselves go, even in situations where it would have been understandable to do so. The boys always bounced back. I find that remarkable and I think we’ll be able to benefit from that for a long time. This season was just the beginning.

Secondly, we wanted to be known once again for the way in which we play. We wanted to reawaken that feeling of ‘Here comes Werder, and everyone knows what that stands for.’ Werder plays high and with confidence, and works their way towards goal. We wanted to defend strongly. We stand for something, no matter our formation or tactics, which vary. I think the fans appreciated that.

Our third goal was to develop players, especially young ones. In my opinion, we exceeded our task in this regard. It’s important for me to say that it’s not us coaches or the club that develop the players—they do it themselves. They accept the offer to take their game to the next level. As an example, I can name Milot Rashica, Maximilian and Johannes Eggestein and Josh Sargent. But, Theodor Gebre Selassie had a great season as well, and Kevin Möhwald improved greatly.”

… the points total: “In my opinion, 53 points are a lot. We were strong in both halves of the season, and collected more points during the second half. On average, over the last three halves of the season, we picked up at least 25 points. That’s good. That’s due to consistency, and not due to the fixture list.”

That deseves our respect and makes me proud
Florian Kohfeldt

…the DFB-Pokal: “We always say that the DFB-Pokal is an extremely important competition for us as a club. We did this with great enthusiasm: against Worms, Flensburg, the emotional highlight of the season in Dortmund, against Schalke, and even against Bayern. Both Bremen and the team experienced a lot that day. We also learned a lot. It made me proud to be their coach after seeing the way the boys treated each other in the dressing room after the game, during a moment filled with frustration and a bit of helplessness, given that the result was influenced a bit by factors out of our control. That made us stronger. We gave it our all this year. I would say that our DFB-Pokal campaign was a success.”

…the support of the fans: “In my opinion, the fans and the city have the feeling that something is happening here based on a clear plan. It’s nice to have that be recognized. Those who work for the club need to be grateful for that. It’s not a given. There are likely Bundesliga clubs where the fans would have booed the players on Saturday for not achieving the goal of playing for Europe. Here, people stood up and showed their respect. I think that’s remarkable and great to see.”

Another objective this season was to develop players like Josh Sargent (Photo: nordphoto).

…missed chances over the course of the season: “I can disregard that. You have to ask yourself, what purpose would that bring now? Up until Saturday, the team and coaching staff did their all in order to ensure that the season would end well. Since Sunday, all my energy has been put towards next season. It doesn’t do any good to think about whether or not we could have won the first leg against Hoffenheim, or whether we should have reacted differently after the 3-2 against Leverkusen. We need to think about tactical things. Where did our opponents make it difficult for us to play our game?  When did we make it difficult for ourselves? I no longer look for individual games—that may have been the case during the season. I remember a conversation I had with ‘Piza’ after the late equalizer against Nürnberg, where he said “That game will stick with us.” We both felt the same way about it. As a footballer, you remember which moments shouldn’t have happened. That’s when I felt it the most. Now, I’m just thinking about next season.”

…planning the squad for next season: “We’ve been planning it for months already. We’re in agreement and have a good lineup already. We’re on a good path. We want to continue to work hard with individual players. For next season, we won’t be among the top ten clubs in the league in terms of investment and salaries. That’s not a bad thing. No one will hear me complain about that. We just need to be smarter, cleverer, and allow players to develop themselves.”

 …the upcoming pre-season: “As a team, the coaches will spend one more week analyzing the season and holding multiple discussions. We will also take some work home with us into the summer break. We will go and observe some international teams that the scouting department has suggested. Are there thinks that we could implement, or that we are already doing? Then we will go on vacation. However, it’s important to not be in Bremen for two to three weeks and to get out of the city for a bit. We will make sure that the coaching staff meets in front of the team. Based on our experience from the last few years, we will also meet outside of Bremen for a workshop of sorts about game ideas and training philosophies, as well as the way pre-season will go. Our pre-season has actually been pretty well planned since April.”

The relationship between the coaching staff and the support staff was strong this year (Photo: Heidmann).

…the interplay between his appearances in front of the media and the team: “The team hear what’s said about us and look to see how the coach deals with that. Whether I like it or not, I’m the face of what goes on here. As a result, I need to be clear in what I do and say. It all has an effect on the dressing room. I knew that before I took on this job, but it became even clearer for me this year. It was a bit uncomfortable for me to receive the award for coach of the year because I didn’t want to be the centre of attention for what happens here. I put a lot of thought into my statements and how the accompanying press release would look. That’s something you don’t really think of before becoming a Bundesliga coach.”

…goals for next season: “There are always objectives you can set, aside from points and goals. It’s a bit early to list concrete goals. What’s important to me is what the team and everyone that works around them takes with them. We had a good working environment in the dressing room. The employees enjoyed coming to work, from the media department to the equipment manager all the way to the laundry team. I saw smiling faces every time I came to work. One of my goals is to maintain this atmosphere. A good sense of togetherness carries over.”

 

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