Baumgart feels bite of winter as Union Berlin fight for Bundesliga survival | Bundesliga

“You’re dressed!” exclaimed a surprised Frank Schmidt as he met his counterpart on the touchline on Sunday. For his first game in charge of Union Berlin, Steffen Baumgart was not just dressed in his customary cap and T-shirt, but in hoodie and gilet as well. A recognition, perhaps, that the team he is now responsible for are facing a long, hard winter.

Being caught on the hop for a first game away loss, as Union were at Schmidt’s Heidenheim, is one thing. But 21 years after his last appearance for Union as a player, Baumgart made his home debut as head coach on Wednesday evening, and given the anticipation on all sides, this was probably even more deflating than Saturday’s comprehensive 2-0 away defeat. He had spoken about how he had never really had the Union job in his career plan as his feeling for the club would just make it mean too much. The 53-year-old wears his heart on his sleeve, even for a coach, and now he has the task of trying to keep the capital club in the division, it’s going to be an emotional rollercoaster.

Baumgart knew he had a job on his hands but this couldn’t have started worse. Two peerless finishes by Alexis Claude-Maurice inside the first half-hour gave Augsburg, a team that arrived at the Alten Försterei with just two away points, a first victory on the road this season. Baumgart called his new team “inefficient”, though if he was implying they regularly created chances of note, he was being generous. Jordan Siebatcheu, without a goal for Union since last February, hit the crossbar when he really should have reduced the deficit early in the second half, but that was about as close as they got. Just 14 Bundesliga goals all season have led the Berliners to their current sequence of 10 league games without a win.

Most of this isn’t down to Baumgart but they are where they are. He didn’t envisage having to call a crisis meeting in the dressing room immediately after his first home game at the helm, but Rani Khedira was abruptly pulled from post-match media commitments to attend. There is no time to ponder. “We are in a relegation battle,” Baumgart admitted. “Everyone has to be aware of that. We don’t need to beat around the bush after 17 points in 17 games.”

After last season’s tale of Icarus, beginning in the Champions League and then needing a stoppage-time winner in the final game to escape the relegation playoff at the end of a four-head coach season, the aim was stability under Bo Svensson. The Dane started well but as the wheels wobbled riding towards Christmas, Union elected to make a change. It could get worse regardless of what happens next on the pitch, with the pre-Christmas draw with Bochum now awarded as a 2-0 win to the bottom club after the incident in which visiting goalkeeper Patrick Drewes was hit with a lighter in stoppage time.

President Dirk Zingler is incandescent, as he repeatedly made clear to Sky before Saturday’s defeat, accusing the DFB of “violating [its] own rules” and saying Bochum were “using the situation to their sporting advantage”. If Union lose their appeal, Baumgart’s mission will get even harder. We expect him to coach on his feet, as always, but at Heidenheim he was already in a touchline stance familiar from the back end of his time in charge of Köln; crouched, almost pained by the impotence of his team. His return to Köpenick, which should have been a moment of joy, suggests winter is far from over.

Talking points

Hats off to Holstein Kiel, who sensationally beat Borussia Dortmund – who they had only played twice before in the DfB Pokal, scoring none, conceding nine – 4-2 to make history and ignite previously impossible-seeming thoughts of staying up in their debut Bundesliga season. The team that had the fewest shots in the league were 3-0 up at half-time with Phil Harres, prolific in the fourth tier for Homburg last season, bagging a seventh in nine top-flight starts and an assist. The team from the division’s northernmost city, known for handball rather than football, have been roundly patronisedbut with a second straight home win (after an almost-as-improbable 5-1 beating of Augsburg in their previous one) they go into Saturday’s game against fellow strugglers Hoffenheim with real hope. “This victory and the trend of the last few weeks – it’s doing something to the boys,” enthused coach Marcel Rapp.

For Dortmund, meanwhile, this was a new low, leaving them 10th at the halfway stage of the season – their worst position at the season’s halfway point since Jürgen Klopp’s final season in charge – though managing director Lars Ricken continues to defend coach Nuri Sahin. “When players believe that they are something special, you get performances like this [which] are simply embarrassing and disgraceful, and unworthy of the shirt,” he seethed. Sahin was equally stark. “Everyone has to look in the mirror,” he said. “The players, the coaches, the entire club. It’s time for us to tell ourselves the complete truth.” Despite Ricken’s backing, a few more negative results might leave an under-pressure BVB board with a decision to make.

It wasn’t a great Englische Woche for Leipzig either. After taking an early lead at Stuttgart through the in-form Benjamin Sesko, new signing Jacob Bruun Larsen – who had been at the club on loan in 2018 – and Nick Woltemade turned the tables in favour of Sebastian Hoeness’s men. The night then went from bad to borderline disastrous for the visitors as both Sesko and Loïs Openda were sent off in the closing minutes. “We’ll think of something,” said Marco Rose, contemplating Saturday’s trip to Bochum, for which André Silva will also be unavailable.

Bayern Munich were already guaranteed the honorary title of Herbstmeister (autumn champion) but restored their four-point lead with ease by way of a 5-0 thumping of teetering Hoffenheim. Leroy Sané excelled and struck twice as he enters the last six months of his contract; whether he stays or goes Bayern are moving to secure the future, with Hoffenheim’s teenage star Tom Bischof signing up for next season and 21-year-old goalkeeper Jonas Urbig set to arrive from Köln in the coming days.

Champions Bayer Leverkusen are hot on their heels – they had closed the gap to a point on Tuesday with a tough win over surprise package Mainz, thanks to Álex Grimaldo’s trademark dipping free-kick winner. “I can’t think of many players who have a technique like that,” smiled Xabi Alonso. It helped extend Leverkusen’s winning run to 11 games in all competitions.

“He’s an Eintracht Frankfurt player. Why shouldn’t he be in the starting XI and play 90 minutes?” Sporting director Markus Krösche might have been a little deliberately disingenuous on the subject of Omar Marmoush – who scored and provided another assist in the 4-1 win over Freiburg – but it is notable that the Manchester City target has continued tearing up the Bundesliga without missing a beat. “It doesn’t surprise me,” said his coach Dino Toppmöller. “He’s a great lad, a real team player and not at all selfish.”