M★RZEC - Man[ager] with a Mission
ENJOY THE STORY! Season 2: 2024-2025 starts HERE
To quickly catch up, go through this regularly updated Wikipedia-page.
Daniel Marzec is a semi-fictional, semi-truthful character.
Most of up to 2018 is 'real life me' - then it becomes mostly fiction.
Not long ago on May 14th 2022, DSC ARMINIA BIELEFELD drew 1:1 against RB Leipzig in the 34th and final round of the 2021/22 Bundesliga.
A mere 14 months later on July 23th 2023, that same team from Bielefeld will have to kick of the 2023/24 3.Liga, having fallen right through the 2.Bundesliga during the 2022/23 season.
THE YO-YO CLUB
Having won the 2019/20 2.Bundesliga, DSC Arminia became the team to secure the most promotions into the German Bundesliga, tying with Der Klub 1.FC Nürnberg at eight. Having to play on the 3rd level of German football only three years later, shows clearly why Arminia Bielefeld is also referred to as The Yo-yo Club: the team moves up and down the German football ladder. In the 21st century alone, Deutscher Sport Club Arminia has spent 8 seasons in Bundesliga, 12 seasons in 2.Bundesliga, while the upcoming season is their fourth at the 3rd level.
In theory Bielefeld ought to be big enough to host a Bundesliga team, or at least a team that swings up and down first and second tier: Arminia plays in the 18th largest city of Germany and the largest of the Ostwestfalen-Lippe (OWL) region.
The OWL-region is part of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), the most populated state in Germany with cities such as Cologne, Düsseldorf, Dortmund, Essen, Duisburg, Bochum, Wuppertal, Bielefeld in 8th, former West-German capital Bonn and Münster - all cities with 300,000 or more residents. In that last city, we find Arminia's biggest rival Preußen, who also play in 3.Liga this season.
The opening game of the season however, Arminia faces SC Verl, the club geographically closest to them as the two are only 18 km (or, a bit over 10 miles) apart.
BIELEFELD BOLD:
ARMINIA goes for AUFSTIEG (promotion)
Daniel Marzec is appointed new head coach at The Arminians. For the 41-year old (September 5th 1981) it's his first job at a professional football team, having served only as youth coach at Wisla Kraków and Ajax Amsterdam before.
His main task is a steep one: both the board as well as the stakeholders demand an immediate return to next season's 2.Bundesliga. "The club has a stadium and budget, big enough to comfortably play a level higher: it's where we belong, the new manager has to take us there!"
Under Marzec, his youth teams often have played a fluid form where the attack ends up with a striker supported by wingers on both sides. This wing play-type tactic has a 4-3-3 as a foundation, but can easily move into a form of 3-4-3 when attacking, or 5-2-3 when defending.
The new manager's main challenge is to mold a team out of a nearly total squad of newcomers: prior to the signing of Marzec, DSC Arminia has bought an entirely new squad. Six youth players were promoted, six players have come in for a single season on loan; all others come from different clubs, 15 players in total.
The only remaining senior player that played for Arminia last year in 2022/23 2.Bundesliga is Fabian Klos (35). The striker has been playing at the club since 2011 and is indispensable as crucial striker, main goalscorer and captain of this side during what is probably the last year of his career.
