Two faces of the crisis: Bundesliga stars expose their club’s flaw | OneFootball

"The team, the collective, comes above everything else" were the words former Wolves coach Daniel Bauer used in January to explain why top scorer Mohamed Amoura was missing from the squad. Last weekend against Bayern, he was dropped again, and Lovro Majer was once more absent from the starting lineup. Both cases highlight Wolfsburg’s biggest problem.

Amoura does deliver goals on the pitch, but in training he repeatedly shows a lack of discipline. According to 'kicker', Amoura had clashed with Leandro Paredes before the game against Bayern, who was also left out of the squad. "In situations like that, there are no two opinions: discipline has to be there, and in that moment in training, it wasn’t," current Wolfsburg coach Dieter Hecking told 'Sky'.

After a similar incident in January, it was the second such squad banishment of the season. According to 'kicker', Amoura had also been involved in "a full-blown altercation with full-back Joakim Maehle" toward the end of last season.

The striker, who has at least scored eight goals in this crisis-hit campaign — in which Wolfsburg slid into the relegation battle despite transfer spending of 68 million euros (source: transfermarkt.de) — is a constant source of unrest and can hardly be a positive influence on the atmosphere within the squad.

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Majer is struggling on the pitch

The situation with Lovro Majer is different: the versatile Croatian has been completely sidelined under Hecking. Under the 61-year-old, he has played just 106 minutes. In the brutal relegation battle, the experienced coach is relying on other players. It is actually crazy, given that with a reported fee of 25 million euros, Majer is still the third-most expensive signing in the club’s history.

In truth, Majer has never really lived up to that price tag. In his first season with VfL, he recorded five goals and five assists, which was certainly respectable, but the year after that he was almost entirely absent due to muscle injuries. This season, he managed five goal contributions in the first half of the campaign, but since matchday 17 he has been waiting for another one.

Although Wolfsburg can still be relegated directly on the final matchday and must face bottom-placed St. Pauli, who are level on points, transfer rumors emerged during the week. A departure is said to be a done deal. The Croatian newspaper 'Jutarnji list' named numerous potential new clubs among European hopefuls — including Eintracht Frankfurt, Como, Napoli, Ajax and Villarreal — and also mentioned a possible, comparatively low fee of ten to twelve million euros.

The timing of this rumor, so shortly before the decisive match, is of course disastrous for Wolfsburg. The clubs reportedly interested are also unlikely to want their interest made public, which quickly led to speculation that Majer’s agents had floated the names in order to get him talked about as a transfer target.

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And that brings us to Wolfsburg’s biggest problem. The club has far too many players in the mold of Amoura and Majer — players who cost significant transfer fees but see the club only as a stepping stone to somewhere else. Players who too often fail to deliver on the pitch, yet still immediately dream of the next club instead of building something with their current one or at least helping clear up the mess first. Players who do not identify with their club and therefore do not step up in times of crisis.

Expectations not met

That is why, despite major investment, Wolfsburg have finished 12th twice, 11th once, and 11th again over the past five years. Now, at best, only the relegation playoff place is still possible. In the process, the club quickly burned through young coaches like Mark van Bommel, Florian Kohfeldt and Paul Simonis. Even experienced managers such as Niko Kovač and Ralph Hasenhüttl ended up despairing over time.

Last weekend against Bayern, Wolfsburg showed what should actually have been possible with the quality in the squad. According to expected goals, they should have won the match 3.88 to 1.97. But the actual result was 0-1. And there have been far too few performances this stirring this season. Or rather, only one.

At VfL, the team, the collective, clearly does not come above everything else. At least not for enough players. If the Wolves want to get out of this spiral, they must in future rely on professionals who do not see Wolfsburg merely as a brief stopover, but want to build something in Lower Saxony and identify with the club.

That, however, is only the medium-term solution. In the short term, Dieter Hecking has to make sure he finds the right players in the current squad who can somehow still prevent relegation. So that he does not become the next experienced coach to despair at this collection of individualists.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇩🇪 here.

📸 RONNY HARTMANN