Arminia Bielefeld’s rollercoaster season, which deviated between the sublime and the ridiculous ended with the club surviving relegation on the final day of the season. After a solid season in 2015/16 under Norbert Meier who had delivered stability to the club, former assistant coach Rüdiger Rehm stepped up to take the reins for this season. However his time in charge was to be very short and after ten rounds he left without a win. Jürgen Kramny was his permanent replacement but was also not to stick around for long and Jeff Sabiene took over for the final 10 rounds. Amidst the chaos, Carsten Rupp, who served as assistant coach to all three, was the one stable factor. He was responsible for 2 league wins in his two stints as caretaker coach, and also delivered the team talk before Bielefeld’s greatest triumph of the season – their 6 – 0 thumping of Eintracht Braunschweig which took the side out of the bottom three. It was a fine performance which showed the potential in the squad that was so rarely evident this season.
Bielefeld’s results throughout the season showed them as being one of the likely relegation candidates The club’s lack of direction and ability to stick with one coach also indicated problems at the heart of the squad. Few players were able to hold down regular spots under all the coaches who took charge this season. Tom Schütz anchored the midfield for much of the season while also filling in at right back at times. Fabian Klos was top scorer with 13, including a run of 8 goals in as many games, but fell out of favour near the end of the season. His regular partner in attack, Andreas Voglsammer managed to combine both goalscoring and creation while also playing in 32 of 34 games and was the best of a fairly average bunch this season. Whether Sabiene manages to stay in charge over the summer remains to be seen, but clearly this squad has more potential than he is managing to get out of them currently.
