Wolfsburg sign Paul Simonis as new coach
A file picture dated 7 August 2010 shows the empty seats of the Wolfburg team players before the match against FC Everton in Wolfsburg, Germany. Jens Wolf/dpa-Zentralbild/dpa
Wolfsburg have signed Paul Simonis as their new head coach, the Bundesliga club said in a statement on Thursday.
Simonis joins from Dutch Cup champions Go Ahead Eagles and signed a contract until June 2027.
Advertisement
He replaces Daniel Bauer, who took over on an interim basis for the final two Bundesliga games of the season after Ralph Hasenhüttl was dismissed.
"I'm really looking forward to working at a top level in a very strong and exciting league," Simonis said.
Managing director for sport Peter Christiansen added: "It was an intensive process, at the end of which we opted for Paul Simonis. He fits our requirements profile perfectly."
Wolfsburg start their pre-season training on July 9. Their first official game in the new season is the first round of the German Cup mid-August.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
27 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Man United ready to rival Liverpool and Chelsea for forward
Manchester United are prepared to rival Liverpool and Chelsea in the race to sign Eintracht Frankfurt forward Hugo Ekitike. Ekitike is in demand after a brilliant season in the Bundesliga, in which the 22-year-old scored 22 goals in all competitions and provided 12 assists. Advertisement His performances helped Frankfurt to Champions League qualification and earned Ekitike a place in the Bundesliga's Team of the Season. Chelsea held talks over a potential transfer before the Club World Cup deadline, while Liverpool are also interested in the Frenchman. Sky Germany claim that Manchester United have now entered the race and have 'expressed concrete interest' in signing Ekitike. Ruben Amorim wants to bring in a centre-forward, though a deal could hinge on funds recouped from sales. United have completed the £62.5m signing of Matheus Cunha from Wolves and are pushing to sign Bryan Mbeumo from Brentford for a similar fee. Advertisement Sales will be required to fund significant further business, with suitors being sought for Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho, Antony and Alejandro Garnacho. Frankfurt have placed an asking price of €100m (£85.1m) on Ekitike and are under no pressure to sell. The forward is contracted until 2029, while Frankfurt's qualification for the Champions League and €70m January sale of Omar Marmoush to Manchester City has strengthened their position. Amorim is targeting a forward as United look to bounce back from their worst season since 1974. The Red Devils finished 15th in the Premier League table and scored just 44 goals. Only Everton and the three relegated teams scored fewer goals than United in 2024/25. Advertisement Read – Club World Cup: Five exciting young talents to watch See more – Nike assemble iconic legends lineup for new kit launches Follow The Football Faithful on Social Media: Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | YouTube | TikTok


New York Times
2 hours ago
- New York Times
Omari Hutchinson and England lay down a marker
England won the last edition of the Under-21 European Championship with players who have become Premier League stars. The class of 2023 included Cole Palmer, still at Manchester City before his move to Chelsea, Morgan Gibbs-White and Anthony Gordon, who had impressive first seasons at Nottingham Forest and Newcastle United. Advertisement The make up of this year's squad in Slovakia is slightly different, but the aim similar: to win and display why they are highly rated. They opened the group with relative ease, beating Czech Republic 3-1, but it was not a victory dominated by the goalscorers. Newcastle's Tino Livramento won player of the match from left-back, and was run closely by Ipswich Town's Omari Hutchinson, who could benefit from having a strong tournament. His now-former club team-mate Liam Delap has completed a move from Ipswich to Chelsea. Delap was part of Lee Carsley's preliminary squad for this tournament, but signing for Chelsea saw the Club World Cup take priority. Hutchinson insists this tournament is his 'main focus' rather than thinking about what could be on the cards for next season but performances like this will have been noted by clubs wanting a winger who can play inside. The 21-year-old, who signed for Ipswich from Chelsea last summer for an initial £20million after playing a starring role in their promotion from the Championship while on loan, played as one of two No 10s in a 4-2-2-2 and dovetailed effortlessly with Livramento to create down England's left flank. Early in the game it was Hutchinson finding a central pocket that allowed the full-back to burst forward and cause problems, whereas Livramento, another former Chelsea youngster, did well to find Hutchinson in dangerous areas. This came together later in the first half. Hutchinson received the ball on halfway, turned and drove through the centre of the pitch. He then laid the ball to Livramento whose cross found scorer Harvey Elliott at the back post, via James McAtee. It was a moment that showed the importance this tournament can have in allowing players to be expressive in areas they can be most effective. 'I try not to be too restrictive in the positions that players play,' Carsley said in his post-match press conference. 'It's more about the attributes and areas of the pitch we can get them into. I've seen Omari so many times at Ipswich get in that pocket, turn and drive with the ball. If he can do that more often for us and be even more selfish when he's driving, he'll never get any complaints from me. The more players we've got that can play for England, the better chances we've got. Advertisement 'There's definitely a tendency, and I've done it in the past, to over-coach because of the amount of time you get with the players. If you give someone too much information, they forget it. So it's just two or three points per player on the areas of the pitch we can cause the opposition a problem.' Pushed on whether he feels he can be more selfish, Hutchinson said: 'I guess so. When I look back at the video, I'll see what I can work on. I'm just trying to improve and impact the game more. If he's telling me to dribble more, then I'll try to dribble more.' McAtee and Elliott combining directly for the goal signified a slightly different element of the platform this tournament can give players. Elliott is one of two players, alongside Charlie Cresswell, who was in the 2023 squad and he admitted last week that he doesn't want to be 'wasting years' of his career by not playing regular first team football at Premier League champions Liverpool. Cresswell, fresh from his first season in France with Toulouse completed the scoring after Jonathan Rowe, of Marseille, had made it 2-0. McAtee opted to join this squad as captain rather than play in the Club World Cup for Manchester City. The 22-year-old said that he hopes that the decision could help 'kick-start' his career in a way the 2023 tournament did for Palmer, who had been his team-mate since the under-11s at City. Palmer started that tournament on the bench, but scored one and assisted two in the semi-finals against Isreal. In the final three days later, it was his free-kick that deflected in off Curtis Jones to win England the tournament. He soon backed that up with goals in the Community Shield and UEFA Super Cup before joining Chelsea for an initial £40million and hasn't looked back since. With 13 of the 23 players in the squad aged 22, they are reaching the stage of their careers where the next step could be the most crucial. Advertisement That can be seen across the tournament too, with Germany's 23-year-old Nick Woltemade for example. The 6ft 6in striker was one of the anticipated players to watch after scoring 17 goals for Stuttgart last season. He underlined that by scoring a hat-trick in Germany's 3-0 win over Slovenia in England's group. That age and experience across the squad should bode well for England though. This opening match was played in front of 8,087 spectators that was a made up of at least 95 per cent Czech Republic supporters. Despite this, Carsley liked how his players 'controlled the crowd and expressed themselves.' With Slovenia to come before Germany, that should provide Hutchinson and England with another opportunity to show what they can do.


New York Times
4 hours ago
- New York Times
Pako Ayestaran: Unai Emery's Aston Villa No 2 who loves pressing – and protecting the planet
Unai Emery did not want to repeat the mistakes of his first crack at managing in England. For his second shot in October 2022, nearly three years on from being fired by Arsenal after just 16 months, he wanted an experienced coach alongside him who knew the Premier League well. A call was made to Pako Ayestaran, a fellow Spaniard who had worked under Emery as La Liga side Valencia's fitness coach in the 2009-10 season, having previously been on Rafa Benitez's staff at Liverpool for three years, including for their Champions League triumph of 2005. Advertisement Ayestaran, now 62, came in as a fresh voice alongside Emery's tried and trusted aides. 'I've seen Villa close up,' former England international Stephen Warnock, who worked with Ayestaran at Liverpool, tells The Athletic. 'Their ideas are very similar. The coaching is very technical; the body movements and the defensive positions are very specific.' 'Every player will have something to improve on,' young Villa defender Sil Swinkels says. 'I did a lot with Pako after training, focusing on recognising where the pressure comes from in possession before passing into mini goals, positioned where the No 10, the left-back or the No 6 would be. Pako would press me from one angle and I would get the ball, take it into the space and find the spare mini-goal and pass through. 'Suddenly, I'd have two coaches pressing me. I then played a couple of games and realised I was just doing a simulation of Pako's drill on the pitch.' Even though they had not worked with each other for more than a decade before reuniting at Villa Park, Emery and Ayestaran share the same overarching principles about the game, centred on control and an emphasis on playing between the lines by overloading central areas. 'It is vital he has the ear of Unai,' says Warnock. 'I spoke to Austin MacPhee (Villa's set-pieces coach) and he was telling me how the coaching staff constantly challenge and push each other. 'Pako told me one of Emery's biggest strengths is that he doesn't dwell on things. They'll make mistakes, but they'll move on and work through it.' Ayestaran was born in the Basque region of Gipuzkoa, the same province in northern Spain Emery hails from. They both came through the ranks locally at Real Sociedad, although Ayestaran is nearly a decade older and had a shorter playing stint there than his future boss, as a central defender, before transitioning into the fitness and conditioning field at age 21. Advertisement A nomadic career ensued, precipitated by Benitez's influence. In 1996, Ayestaran was promoted from fitness coach to be an assistant under Benitez at fellow Spanish sides Osasuna, Extremadura and Tenerife, before joining him at Valencia and then Liverpool. Now close to entering his fourth decade in various coaching positions, the 62-year-old has held 14 different roles at 11 clubs and in six countries. 'There was an element of good cop, bad cop with (him and) Rafa,' Warnock says. 'But Pako had a steely side, too. If he wasn't happy, he'd tell you. But he would try to keep you upbeat. If you weren't in the squad, he'd chat to you to make things easier. Those players would train early on Saturday (before the weekend's first-team game) and he would join in the session. 'I once had issues with cramp and he organised a programme to get rid of it by working on strength exercises.' Ayestaran had a transformative effect on squad availability at Anfield. He implemented modern sports science, creating data that showed the precise number of minutes an individual had played. This helped design a rotation policy to ensure Liverpool peaked during a season's defining period. He also had three man-made 'Pako hills' constructed along the perimeter of Melwood, Liverpool's training complex at the time, in 2006 for running exercises. They were of different gradients, sculpted to improve players' endurance. 'When Rafa would be coaching the technical elements, Pako would stand on a different side of the pitch saying, 'Do you understand what he's after?',' Warnock says. ''This is what we're trying to achieve'. He wouldn't put on many sessions (himself) as Rafa was very hands-on, but colder in his manner.' Ayestaran and Benitez fitted one another nicely for more than a decade. In that time, they won promotion to La Liga with Tenerife, two Spanish league titles and a UEFA Cup (today's Europa League) at Valencia, then an FA Cup and that Champions League (while also getting to another final of the latter competition) on Merseyside. Advertisement An 11-year partnership spanning five clubs collapsed at the start of the 2007-08 season, with Benitez failing to hide his disappointment. He accused Ayestaran of 'betrayal', asserting he had discreetly contacted other clubs about jobs. His long-time lieutenant was placed on gardening leave. 'I worked with him for 11 years,' Benitez later told UK newspaper The Times. 'It's a wound that still hurts. Liverpool gave him autonomy and power, and that changed him a lot — he wanted more and more. One day, I found out he had serious contacts with other teams, and that seemed to me a betrayal towards me and the club that I couldn't accept.' 'That's not true. I never looked at any jobs behind his back,' Ayestaran responded in an interview with the Liverpool Echo newspaper in 2015. 'It's true I had offers from Spain, but Rafa knew about them.' In his autobiography published in that same year, Liverpool's captain of that era, Steven Gerrard, acknowledged the team missed Ayestaran's 'stabilising presence' after his exit. 'We lost a lot when Rafa fell out with Pako,' he wrote. 'We all loved his training and his methods. I always felt so fresh and fired up when going out to play a match under Pako. The communication had been perfect under Ayestaran, and when he left, it declined. I felt Rafa had changed and had no confidence in his new staff. For me, he's the perfect No 2.' 'Pako's English is great,' Warnock says. 'Rafa's wasn't very good at the beginning, so Pako would do a lot of the explaining.' Ayestaran headed home for Real Sociedad to become sporting director, albeit that only lasted for a matter of weeks due to a hierarchical conflict. Having reverted to being a fitness coach at Benfica in Portugal and then back with Valencia, he returned as a No 2 at Al Ahli in Dubai. However, it felt a natural step for Ayestaran, by now in his fifties and with ample experience, to make a go of it in the most senior role. He was appointed manager of a second-tier Mexican side, Estudiantes Tecos, in 2013, but left at the end of that season after failing to win promotion. This was the first of his three coaching roles in Mexico. After resigning at Maccabi Tel Aviv — despite winning the Israeli club's first-ever treble in 2015 — he returned that same year with Santos Laguna. A pattern emerged of Ayestaran returning to clubs back home he'd worked for previously after more far-flung jobs and, in most cases, challenging environments with unstable boards. But in his third spell with Valencia, after lasting only three months at Santos Laguna, he had both. In February 2016, a then clubless Ayestaran received a call from their new manager, Gary Neville — on the advice of his Sky Sports punditry colleague Jamie Carragher, who was coached by the Spaniard at Liverpool — asking him to return to the Mestalla stadium once more. Neville felt he needed more Spanish-speaking staff to get through to the players and Ayestaran was parachuted in, serving as a final attempt to arrest the team's decline. Ayestaran took over when Neville was fired the following month, though he had been in two minds about accepting the job. He felt a sense of loyalty, later admitting he put a clause in his initial contract that stated 'if Gary went, I would go, too', yet it was Neville who convinced him to take the role. Ayestaran was appointed on an interim basis at first, before signing a two-year deal that summer. Advertisement He lasted only another couple of months — not helped by fan protests towards Peter Lim's unpopular ownership, Valencia lost their first four matches of the 2016-17 season and he too was sacked. His reputation further diminished in Spain as he left Las Palmas early the following season, having survived just seven league matches after his September appointment — without winning any of them. So Ayestaran went to manage in Mexico again, at top-tier team Pachuca, in May 2018. 'He was very methodical,' says Pachuca's head physiotherapist, Pedro Joel Robelo. 'He was charismatic and observant. His fitness background meant he paid close attention to preventive work against injuries.' He and Pachuca parted ways the following January. In August 2020, Ayesteran was appointed manager at Tondela of the Portuguese Primeira Liga. 'Pako cycled to the stadium every day,' says Francisco Favinha, the club's director of communications. 'He was mid-fifties but ran on the stadium's pitch and swam. He was very concerned about the environment, like recycling, reducing waste and saving water. He was a man of principle and very affable.' Ayestaran had a keen eye for internal processes and, upon joining Tondela, became fixated on the club's structure from top to bottom, intending to further professionalise operations. On his first day, he met Tondela's academy staff to make his youth policy known. Monchi, Damian Vidagany, Unai Emery and his backroom team have worked tirelessly to deliver history in their first full season at Villa Park. 🤝 🇪🇸 Pako Ayestarán 🇪🇸 Pablo Villanueva 🇪🇸 Javi García 🇪🇸 Rodri 🏴 Austin MacPhee 🇪🇸 Moisés De Hoyo 🇪🇸 Víctor Mañas — Aston Villa (@AVFCOfficial) May 15, 2024 'Pako had a good first season, but the second didn't go well,' Favinha says. 'He was fired in the final stretch and Tondela were relegated. At the same time, he was responsible for Tondela reaching the (2021-22) Portuguese Cup final.' 'He had his own style and was very professional,' says Jose Alves, Tondela's sports therapist. 'The most negative aspect was his very long training sessions. But he was accessible and focused on social causes, such as recycling and waste.' Advertisement Once Ayestaran received the call to reunite with Emery at Villa in late 2022, there was little hesitation. His career had come full circle and having managed, directed and assisted at unstable clubs — to varying degrees of success — the experience he could impart on the Birmingham-based side's coaching team felt integral. Ayestaran may be an overlooked cog in Villa's broader functions, but his importance cannot be understated. The knowledge from a unique career in football has contributed to him becoming the perfect foil to Emery.