Fan boycott, next bankruptcy
Cologne’s Baumgart despairs of “shitty situation”
November 1, 2023, 8:18 a.m
The coach’s two outbursts of anger also had no effect: 1. FC Köln was eliminated from the DFB Cup by second division team Kaiserslautern. Coach Steffen Baumgart is facing the most complicated situation of his time in office – so it doesn’t help that the fans are stopping their support.
Head coach Steffen Baumgart sees the situation at the struggling Bundesliga club 1. FC Cologne becoming increasingly precarious. “We’re in an absolutely shitty situation at the moment. But we’re the only ones who can get us out. That’s just the way it is. We have to do it,” said the 51-year-old Baumgart late Tuesday evening on ZDF. Effzeh had previously lost the second round cup game against second division team 1. FC Kaiserslautern 2:3 (0:1) – and had meanwhile fallen behind 0:3.
In the Bundesliga we were 17th in the table. lost seven of nine games, and now the DFB Cup ended early. “It wasn’t quite as bad as 3-0 sounds. That’s positive, but not positive enough. You lost a game that you shouldn’t lose,” said Baumgart. It is probably the most complicated situation of his term in office so far. You can tell that the boys are also working in their heads, added the head coach. The Bundesliga is waiting on Saturday (3.30 p.m./Sky and in the ntv.de live ticker) a home game against FC Augsburg.
Now also the fan boycott
After the 6-0 defeat in Leipzig last Saturday, Baumgart recently publicly counted his team and criticized their attitude. On Monday he followed up: “I always put myself in front of my team. But at some point it’s time for work.” If some people can’t implement this, “I have to be even more clear. I’ll go along with a lot of things. What I won’t go along with is if no one knows what it’s about.” He predicted a difficult season for his club. “It must be clear to everyone that we are having a very difficult year, that the relegation battle will come down to the last match day,” said Baumgart.
In addition, the people of Cologne, who are deep in crisis, obviously have to earn the support of their fans again. After the cup defeat, the players waited in vain for encouragement from the 4,000 supporters who had traveled to Kaiserslautern. “They were dissatisfied with the result, the 0:6 was also a factor – you can understand that,” said goalkeeper Marvin Schwäbe, commenting on the silence in the visitors’ block. Timo Hübers saw it similarly: “The fans were as disappointed as we were.”
“Things aren’t going so well in the league”
Previously, the second-to-last Bundesliga team had suffered another depressing defeat in the atmospheric traditional duel against the sixth-placed team in the second division. In front of 49,327 spectators at the sold-out Betzenberg, Richmond Tachie (19th), Kenny Prince Redondo (47th) and Marlon Ritter (65th) scored for the Palatinate team, who secured the bonus of 862,400 euros for advancing.
Even the late goals from Florian Kainz (71st) and Mark Uth (81st) did not change Cologne’s misery, especially since they finished the game with ten men: Captain Kainz was shown red in the 84th minute for serious foul play. Five minutes earlier, Eric Martel, who had already been substituted, had received a yellow-red card for unsportsmanlike conduct.
“We’re super disappointed. Things aren’t going so well in the league. We wanted to take a sense of success with us into the league, but we missed that,” said Hübers. Goalscorer Uth admitted that the players are mentally weak. “When you’re in such a negative spiral, at some point your head starts to go bad,” said the goalscorer. A win on Saturday against FC Augsburg is a must for Uth: “We know what’s at stake on Saturday – we have to win the game.”