Hecking named as new Moenchengladbach coach

Berlin (AFP) – Dieter Hecking was on Thursday named as the new coach of Borussia Moenchengladbach, the former Wolfsburg manager’s arrival coming 24 hours after the sacking of Andre Schubert.

Hecking, dismissed by Wolfsburg in October, has signed a deal with the struggling Bundesliga side until 2019.

Schubert on Wednesday became the seventh Bundesliga coach fired since September when Moenchengladbach dismissed him in the wake of their 2-1 defeat to ironically Hecking’s former employers and fellow underperformers Wolfsburg.

That home loss was the final straw for Gladbach’s director of sport Max Eberl, who had said the team needed to win their last three games before Christmas for Schubert’s future to be safe.

But after losing to Augsburg and earning a scrappy win over Mainz, Gladbach’s defeat to Wolfsburg on Tuesday was their eighth defeat in 16 league games to leave them 14th.

They have won just once in their last ten games in all competitions.

The 52-year-old Hecking steered Wolfsburg to the German Cup title in 2015, the year they were runners up in the Bundesliga.

They also reached the knock-out stages of the Champions League last season for the first time in the club’s history.

But he was released after three-and-a-half years in the job following a 1-0 defeat at home to newly-promoted RB Leipzig in mid-October.