Per Fabrizio, former Croatia captain and head coach, Niko Kovač, has been named new manager at Borussia Dortmund until the summer of 2026. He last managed Wolfsburg in 2024 before being sacked on March 17th. He also has short tenures with Eintracht Frankfurt, Bayern Munich and Monaco from 2016-2022. He won the German Cup with Frankfurt in 2018, the club’s first trophy since 1988.
Although Niko Kovač played 379 matches in the Bundesliga as a midfielder, he has yet to grasp the league from a coaching standpoint. So let’s see how this stint goes with his fourth Bundesliga club at the helm. Kovać managed Croatia at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, but many in the media said he was too “German” in his coaching style for the Croatian players.
At the moment of his hire, Borussia Dortmund sit in 11th position on the Bundesliga table; six points behind a Champions League berth for next campaign.
A few points:
1) Robert once again tagging along to be his assistant, lol
2) Dortmund still in CL this year – finished 10th 15 points – 1 point from top 8 (w/ superior GD to teams in 6-8 position) – draw is today will face either Sporting or Brugge (Pasalic will face the other team) – they actually finished ahead of Bayern 12th (Bayern or Modric will get Man City (or Celtic) in the play-off round, lol) – so they are hiring him to help them progress in CL THIS year
3) Dortmund also in the Club World Cup this summer (only other Bundesliga team there is Bayern) – they are in Group F along w/ Fluminense, Ulsan, Mamelodi Sundowns – so no rest of Niko/players this summer
4) Niko has managed c.200 Bundesliga games already – look at list of most Bundesliga games managed – most managers who have managed c.200-250 games (c.25 of them) have done so w/ multiple teams – only 2 have been w/ 1 club – most have been b/w 3-5 clubs – some as many as 6 clubs – context is important v-a-v Niko i.e. Bungesliga clubs change their managers a lot
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Bundesliga_managers
5) Niko coached Wolfsburg across 1.667 campaigns (2022-2023 (complete) / 2023-2024 (2/3rds thru to March)) – some highlights:
– Aug 2022: bought Bartol Franjic for 7.5m (and than only played him 5 times and has been on loan ever since, now of course back w/ DZ)
– Aug 2022: let Pongracic leave on loan for Lecce
– Jan 2023: let Brekalo leave for Fiorentina
– May 2023: he p*ssed off Marmoush so much during 2022-2023 season that he refused to sign a new contract and left that summer on a FREE transfer to Eintracht (who flipped him in 1.5 years to Man City)
– Aug 2023: Micky VDV signs for Tottenham 😊 Remarkably Micky did not pull his hamstring during the 2022-2023 season w/ Niko in charge – somehow Niko was able to keep him healthy for the whole season (the only season of his career he hasn’t pulled his hamstring) – Niko pls tell us how ?
– Aug 2023: bought Lovro Majer for 25m (and played him every game until he was fired in March 2024)
Yet to Grasp???? lol..
Kovač led Frankfurt to its first trophy since 1988. He finished with a record of 38 wins, 20 draws and 33 losses in 91 matches which gave him the coaching gig at Bayern. Hansi Flick joined Bundesliga club Bayern Munich as an assistant coach, under the management of Niko Kovač where he promptly used his influence to get Niko Fired and took the job. Kovač led Bayern to a league and cup double when Bayern defeated RB Leipzig 3–0 in the 2019 DFB-Pokal Final. It was Kovač’s second consecutive cup win as he became the first coach since Felix Magath in 2005 and 2006 to win back-to-back cup titles. Kovač also became the first person to win a league and cup double both as a player and coach in German football
Niko Kovac got the sack from Bayern because he lost the changeroom.
Thomas Muller led the revolt against him because Kovac benched him for a couple of months and Muller and some of his senior friends in the squad started undermining Kovac which led to his sacking.
In an interview a few years later Kovac admitted that he would have done things differently if he had another chance.
Niko Kovac is a good youth team coach.
He did well at Frankfurt because the players were young and relative nobodies at that point in their careers. He does a terrible job, however, when it comes to managing star players and veterans.
He gets credit for winning a cup with Frankfurt, but winning a cup with Bayern (who has the highest payroll in the league) is not so much an achievement, it is an expectation.
He focuses a lot on fitness and discipline, but he’s largely an idiot when it comes to tactics.
We all saw this when he coached the National Team, where his lineups did not make any sense and we easily crashed out in the first round of the World Cup 2014 (despite having one of our strongest teams of All Time, all of them in their prime too).
He also implemented random rules like “no talking” during practices and “no flip flops” in the hotel room…all in the name of ‘discipline’.
Modric, Dudu, and several others have been pretty critical of him, and he lost the locker room (despite the Croatian National Team being filled with character guys). He also lost the locker room at Bayern as well.
He’s not the type of coach for a top team in a top league that has established players. He’s better as a mid-table team’s coach, that has up-and-coming young players who will tolerate his rules and his focus on fitness may help them progress in their careers.
Borussia Dortmund may be a good fit for him, since they tend to bring in a lot of young guys…however, if they are expecting him to make deep Champions League runs, then he will be fired within 18 months.
Niko Kovac is a good youth team coach.
He did well at Frankfurt because the players were young and relative nobodies at that point in their careers. He does a terrible job, however, when it comes to managing star players and veterans.
He gets credit for winning a cup with Frankfurt, but winning a cup with Bayern (who has the highest payroll in the league) is not so much an achievement, it is an expectation.
He focuses a lot on fitness and discipline, but he’s largely a nimrod when it comes to tactics.
We all saw this when he coached the National Team, where his lineups did not make any sense and we easily crashed out in the first round of the World Cup 2014 (despite having one of our strongest teams of All Time, all of them in their prime too).
He also implemented random rules like “no talking” during practices and “no flip flops” in the hotel room…all in the name of ‘discipline’.
Modric, Dudu, and several others have been pretty critical of him, and he lost the locker room (despite the Croatian National Team being filled with character guys). He also lost the locker room at Bayern as well.
He’s not the type of coach for a top team in a top league that has established players. He’s better as a mid-table team’s coach, that has up-and-coming young players who will tolerate his rules and his focus on fitness may help them progress in their careers.
Borussia Dortmund may be a good fit for him, since they tend to bring in a lot of young guys…however, if they are expecting him to make deep Champions League runs, then he will be fired within 18 months.
Borussia Dortmund should consider Zlatko Dalic when he leaves Croatia after the 2026 World Cup cycle. He has proven to be successful at the world’s biggest stage.
Handball FT Croatia 31 v France 28
France kept on pegging us back in the second half but we held out and now go to Oslo to face Denmark or Portugal who play tomorrow.
Unbelievable atmosphere in Zagreb Arena throughout the match and after the match.
Too bad the final is in Norway.
We’re LONG overdue for a World Cup handball title. We only have one title (in 2003), which is sad considering we’re probably a top-5 handballing nation all time.
Winning this title would at least put us 6th on the all-time list.
We won a few gold medals tho didnt we? I seem to remember us doing well at handball and water polo with olympics.
Yes, we’re one of the best at the Olympics (with a couple of golds and a bronze). We’re really just behind France and Denmark there.
However, at the World Cups, we haven’t been as good.
Agree, it will be hard as I expect Denmark to beat Portugal.
The crowd in the final will probably be 95% Danish or supporting them?
To win the final we would need to play like today against the French.
First half performance was one of the best that I have seen from us ever, we were leading at one stage by nine goals against current European champs and absolutely destroying them and the crowd going crazy.
Denmark are the heavy, heavy favorites.
They’ve been sweeping tournaments since they started taking handball seriously 10 years ago.
They are the defending World Cup three-peat Champions.
They won the gold medal in 2019, 2021 and 2023 by a pretty decent margin too. The wins weren’t even close.
They also won gold at the 2016 and 2024 Olympics (with a silver in the 2020 Olympics).
So, they literally won 5 of the last 6 World Cup and Olympics golds (with their only ‘silver’ being a narrow loss to France at the 2020 Olympic Finals).
The ‘good’ news is that they lost in the European Handball Championship Final last year to France in extra time. So they only got a silver there too. I guess we can take solace in that, ha ha.
Don’t know much about handball, but watched the last few minutes, with the Croatian fans going crazy, pretty awesome to watch. Assuming they play Denmark in the final Sunday in Norway. Will be tough, but hope they can pull it off.
Ljutic wins her 3rd in Courchevel.
Handball HT Croatia 18 v France 11
Superb performance so far, best in many years against strong opposition.
oh nice
Zrinka Ljutic wins her third slalom of the year by 1.26 seconds.
Lets hope it is a good omen for the Handball SF starting in a few minutes on RTL.
Dalic and Lovren at the game giving support and interviews on RTL.