VfL Wolfsburg faced SC Paderborn in the Relegations-Rückspiel on Monday evening at 20.30 Uhr, needing a win after the 0:0 first leg to stay in the Bundesliga. For Dieter Hecking, 61, it was also the last stretch of his spell as Wolfsburg coach, with his contract expiring as the club’s season reached its most dangerous point.
Hecking had taken over in mid-March and kept the focus squarely on the task in front of him. "Wir wollten das Finale - jetzt spielen wir es," he said, adding, "Wir haben alle Möglichkeiten, die Klasse zu halten." Wolfsburg had been in a long stretch near the bottom of the table and had shown little life for periods before he arrived, which made the playoff an escape route as much as a punishment.
The build-up to paderborn vs wolfsburg was anything but elaborate. Before the first leg, the team held a grill party with players and their families, and before the second leg Hecking did not use a short training camp or other unusual matchday routines. He said the side trained very lightly on the day before the match, explaining the low-key approach with the words, "Das muss man auch machen. Warum soll ich mein Leben nur wegen einem Spiel ändern?"
Hecking also brushed off the idea that Wolfsburg needed to turn itself inside out to prepare. "Ich war auf der Landesgartenschau. Ich habe nichts gesehen vom Pokalfinale," he said, after Bayern Munich won the cup final in Berlin on Saturday evening. "Ich kann es nur jedem empfehlen, dahinzugehen. Das ist eine tolle Örtlichkeit," he added, making clear he did not spend the eve of the playoff watching events elsewhere.
The tension around Wolfsburg did not stop at the pitch. Media reports said there were already considerations of using Hecking later in another role at the club, possibly as Geschäftsführer or Berater, even though his current contract was expiring. At the same time, Dietmar Kühbauer was mentioned as a possible new coach after becoming Austrian double winner with LASK, a sign that planning for next season was already moving alongside the fight to survive this one.
That possibility adds another layer to a night that could still define Wolfsburg’s identity. The club won the Bundesliga title in 2009 and the DFB-Pokal in 2015 with Hecking as coach, but this playoff carried the threat of its first-ever relegation from the Bundesliga. Hecking, who said on Sunday that the team had all possibilities to stay up, put it more bluntly when he described the recent performance: "Es war nicht unser bestes Spiel in den letzten Wochen." He also said, "Wir haben ein paar Dinge gemacht, die wir so in den letzten Wochen nicht gemacht" — a reminder that even at the end of a long rescue run, Wolfsburg were still searching for the version of themselves that had kept the door open.
