{"id":59605,"date":"2026-04-12T07:04:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T07:04:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/59605\/"},"modified":"2026-04-12T07:04:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T07:04:08","slug":"union-berlin-appoints-marie-louise-eta-to-secure-bundesliga-survival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/59605\/","title":{"rendered":"Union Berlin appoints Marie-Louise Eta to secure Bundesliga survival"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>BERLIN (AP) \u2014 Union Berlin has appointed Marie-Louise Eta as the first female coach in charge of a men\u2019s team in the Bundesliga as it bids to ensure its league survival.<\/p>\n<p>The 34-year-old Eta takes over from Steffen Baumgart, who was fired with his assistants Danilo de Souza and Kevin McKenna after the team\u2019s 3-1 loss at last-place Heidenheim on Saturday, Union announced just before midnight.<\/p>\n<p>Eta, who was coaching the Under-19 men\u2019s team and agreed earlier this month to take over as <a class=\"Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement\" data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/www.fc-union-berlin.de\/en\/news\/marie-louise-eta-becomes-womens-head-coach-Td1jbL\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">coach of Union\u2019s women\u2019s team<\/a> next season, has five games to secure Union\u2019s Bundesliga survival.<\/p>\n<p>She made history in 2023 as the <a class=\"Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement\" data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/bundesliga-eta-union-berlin-first-female-assistant-coach-113239cb7d47b5fb279205ce826966ec\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">first female assistant coach in the Bundesliga<\/a> and across the top divisions of Europe\u2019s \u201cbig five\u201d soccer leagues. She had to step in for media duties for head coach Nenad Bjelica when he was <a class=\"Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement\" data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/nenad-bjelica-banned-leroy-sane-5ae436fb374ac96cf7a4e9e4c5731fa8\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">suspended for three games<\/a> in 2024.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m delighted that Marie Louise Eta has agreed to take on this role on an interim basis before she becomes head coach of the women\u2019s first team as planned in the summer,\u201d Union sporting director Horst Heldt said in a statement.<\/p>\n<p>Baumgart, a former Union player, was <a class=\"Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement\" data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/union-berlin-coach-baumgart-b50dc309f550c6c4db1e8421d8406ffe\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">appointed during the 2024-25 winter break<\/a> but Heldt said recent results prompted the club to take drastic action.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve had an completely disappointing second half of the season so far and we\u2019re not letting the table fool us \u2014 our situation remains precarious and we desperately need points to secure our place in the league.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Defeat in Heidenheim left Union in 11th place in the 18-team division, just seven points clear of St. Pauli in the relegation zone with five rounds remaining.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTwo wins out of 14 games since the winter break and the performances shown in recent weeks do not give us the confidence that we can turn things around with the current setup. We have therefore decided to make a fresh start,\u201d Heldt said.<\/p>\n<p>Union next hosts Wolfsburg, which is also fighting for survival, next weekend.<\/p>\n<p>___<\/p>\n<p>An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that Marie-Louise Eta had previously served as a head coach.<\/p>\n<p>___<\/p>\n<p>AP soccer: <a class=\"Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement\" data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/soccer\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/soccer<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BERLIN (AP) \u2014 Union Berlin has appointed Marie-Louise Eta as the first female coach in charge of a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":59606,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[99],"tags":[112,2355,32803,190,25670,32804,24463,32805,133,135,20698,2353],"class_list":{"0":"post-59605","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-berlin","8":"tag-berlin","9":"tag-bundesliga","10":"tag-danilo-de-souza","11":"tag-germany","12":"tag-horst-heldt","13":"tag-kevin-mckenna","14":"tag-labor-unions","15":"tag-marie-louise-eta","16":"tag-soccer","17":"tag-sports","18":"tag-steffen-baumgart","19":"tag-union-berlin"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/116390465606200787","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59605","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59605"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59605\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}