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Has taken on a difficult job: Coach Florian Kohfeldt at SV Darmstadt 98. © IMAGO/Jan Huebner
SV Darmstadt 98’s luck has run out. Two cruciate ligament tears make the task for new coach Florian Kohfeldt even more difficult ahead of the basement clash against Braunschweig.
One thing you can’t say, even with the best will in the world, is that the lily is blessed with luck. Quite the opposite is the case. Basically, the creeping decline of SV Darmstadt 98 began with the celebrated promotion in 2023. A year ago, nothing seemed to be going right. The enthusiasm at Böllenfalltor literally collapsed, the start to the season failed, the South Hesse team never got into a flow, everything was difficult, rocky. Injured players reported themselves off en masse, there were hefty beatings on the pitch, and in the end the fans even fought among themselves. Without a sound, they went back down to the lower house.
And the restart in the second division was also a disaster. Four games, one point, 17th place in the table, the popular coach Torsten Lieberknecht is gone, another, Florian Kohfeldt, is now there. And he starts the consolidation mission with two shocking pieces of news: two regular players have torn cruciate ligaments, Paul Will and Matthias Bader will be out for at least half a year, probably longer. Phew. Things couldn’t get off to a worse start for the new coach. That’s a heavy burden.
Kohfeldt gets going like a fire brigade, is passionate about the matter, is communicative, loud, positive; he tries to get the bruised Lilies back on their feet. The former Bremen player is still fighting despite the two pieces of bad news. That is right and good.
Much depends on Kohfeldt
Even more than before, the sporting fate depends on the new coach, who must create a different mood, a different feeling, in order to get the newly assembled, unsettled and now even weaker team back on track. This is not a mission impossible, but it is a herculean task. Kohfeldt must work, otherwise the worst case scenario is a fall into the third division. It would not be the first club to have been relegated. There are enough warning examples; the last two clubs that had to pick up the pieces in the third division two years after being promoted to the Bundesliga are SC Paderborn and Arminia Bielefeld. It does not have to come to that in Darmstadt.
But the Lilies must find their way back to the old unity that once made them so strong. For a long time under Lieberknecht, but even earlier under Dirk Schuster. Florian Kohfeldt must create a now-more-than-ever mentality, transform the Böllenfalltor into a fortress. The first opportunity will come on Saturday, when Eintracht Braunschweig comes. The 17th will face the 18th. It doesn’t get more like a basement duel.
