With Jürgen Klopp leaving Borussia Dortmund this summer it’s been announced that Thomas Tuchel will replace him starting in 2015/16. But who is Thomas Tuchel and why is he one of Europe’s most in-demand managers? Jack Dowell takes a look…

T he Bundesliga 2014/15 campaign has been a frantic season of managerial changes that has seen Schalke, Stuttgart, Hamburg (twice), Mainz, Werder Bremen and Hertha Berlin all on the hunt for a new boss, and a certain name keeps being linked to jobs with a regularity that a mid-2000-era Alan Curbishley would be proud of.

Thomas Tuchel, who has been on a year’s leave after Mainz refused to prematurely release him from his contract last summer, was the go to out-of-work manager for rumour-mongers to fill gossip columns in Germany, before he finally accepted Borussia Dortmund’s offer to become manager from the 2015-16 campaign. The 41-year-old was handed the reins to Mainz, Jürgen Klopp’s former club before his move to Dortmund in 2008, and Tuchel has once again been tasked with building on the heavy metal enthusiast’s legacy.

SEE ALSO: Jürgen Klopp revolutionised Borussia Dortmund and football, but was eaten by the monster he created

On paper, Tuchel’s curriculum vitae appears lacking. With fewer than 100 appearances as a senior professional, five trophyless seasons at Mainz and only one short campaign in European football, which ended in defeat to Romanian minnows Gaz Metan Medias, what managerial credentials does he possess?

Thomas Tuchel: European football’s next hipster coach

Tuchel came through the ranks at Augsburg and made three appearances for Germany Under-18s. That aside, a rather uninspiring career featured spells at Stuttgarter Kickers and SSV Ulm – where he was managed by Ralk Rangnick – before his playing days were sadly cut short by a cartilage injury in his mid-twenties.

Tuchel turned to coaching and began a role at VfB Stuttgart as a youth coach. During his spell with Die Scwaben, the club nurtured the talents of future Germany internationals Sami Khedira and Sebastian Rudy as well as regular Bundesliga starters Andreas Beck, Matthias Lehmann and Adam Szalai. Tuchel helped win Stuttgart the Under-19 Bundesliga title in 2005, an early sign of his promise.

In 2006 Tuchel returned to Augsburg, where he had made his name as a powerful and composing defender at youth level, to oversea the co-ordination of their youth team, before moving west to Mainz to perform a similar role.

Following Mainz’s promotion to the Bundesliga in 2009, the directors opted for the leftfield approach of appointing a 35-year-old with no senior managerial experience and plucked Tuchel from his position as Under-19’s coach after he had again won the U19 Bundesliga this time with Mainz’s youth team the previous season.

The gamble paid off.

After a reasonable 9th place finish in his first season, Tuchel’s second season with Die Nullfünfer hit major heights. Mainz won their opening seven straight matches in 2010/11 including a victory over Bayern Munich at the Allianz Arena, to equal a Bundesliga record for the best ever start to a season. Mainz would end the season in fifth place, the club’s highest ever league finish.

Despite not capitalising on European qualification with two 13th place finishes the following two seasons and an early exit from Europe in their one campaign, Tuchel managed to guide Mainz back into the competition with a seventh placed finish in 2014, building his reputation as a bright young manager along the way with players like Andre Schürrle and Adam Szalai under his wing.

By this time, his abilities as a manager had interested both Schalke and Bayer Leverkusen who were seeking a new manager. Tuchel expressed his ambitions to become a Champions League manager and attempted to leave the club in order to begin negotiations.

Mainz refused to accept his resignation and with Tuchel still under contract until the summer of 2015, he has been unable to accept a new job during this season. Although not technically a sabbatical, Tuchel took a year off to recharge his batteries, using the time to learn more about the game in order to fine-tune his tactical awareness.

Tactical approach

One of the main reasons Tuchel is so revered is due to the meticulous preparation that goes into organising his team. Using information gathered on the opposition, Tuchel regularly changes formations, tactics and personnel to produce a system he sees as capable of getting the best possible result.

This approach doesn’t just apply to his pre-match approach but also during games. Tuchel’s Mainz team throughout the 2013-14 season would effortlessly change systems, formations and positions during matches depending on how the game was playing out. Tuchel instills an organised fluidity in a flexible team to maximise the impact of every outcome.

A formation that Tuchel created to great effect is a robust 5-2-2-1, better known as a midfield pentagon due to the positioning of the deeper midfield duo being slightly narrower than the more advanced duo that are spearheaded by a lone striker.

The pentagon is used to absorb pressure and pack the middle of the pitch, making it difficult for teams to have time on the ball. In this system, central attacks are diffused when the ball is played out-wide as the wider central defender joins the full-back to double up on the winger while a defensive midfielder drops in centrally to offer cover.

The defensive line behind the diamond is often quite deep. Whilst this enables plenty of room for a counter-attack at the other end of the pitch, it creates less space for a long-ball to be played, forcing the opponent to keep possession in midfield.

As the opponent attempts to pass the ball, the four midfielders in the pentagon relentlessly press in a pack, trying to win possession or force the ball wide or backwards. The centre forward is also involved in pressing, often retreating to a position in between the two advanced midfielders to form a three-pronged press that aims to cut off midfield options.

The centre forward and the advanced midfielders then form the base of the counter-attack, which attacks directly with emphasis on exploiting space in behind and out wide with accurate, fast passing and precise movement, rather than dribbling. One of the deeper midfielders often attempts to join the attack, timing a run from deep to emerge unmarked on the edge of the box or unannounced in the penalty area seeking to get on the end of a cross.

Unlike other approaches that focus on intense pressing, by managing the game in a way that allows the opposition to have possession in their half or out wide, Tuchel gave plenty of opportunity for his side to have brief respite rather than run themselves into the ground.

Despite this, Tuchel often prefers younger players – not solely due to their energy levels but also as younger players are often more eager to play in experimental formations and do things not usually asked of them, as opposed to more senior professionals who would prefer more traditional or less risky approaches. This is reflected in Tuchel’s recruitment policy.

Faith in youth

At Mainz, Tuchel oversaw the development of a number of exciting young players who had been struggling to make the step-up from youth to senior football. During Mainz’s famous 2010-11 season, Tuchel combined the attacking threats of Andre Schürrle, who had been promoted from the 2009 title-winning Mainz Under-19 side, with the loan signings of Ádám Szalai from Real Madrid Castilla and Schalke’s Lewis Holtby. The success of these young attackers was displayed in the regularity of their goal celebrations in which the trio imitated a rock-band and they became nicknamed the Bruchweg Boys to Die Nullfunfer fans.

Tuchel’s success in attracting talented young footballers continued with the purchases of Julian Baumgartlinger, Nicolai Müller, Loris Karius, Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting and more recently by recruiting current Germany Under-21 internationals Johannes Geis from Greuther Fürth and Yunus Malli from Borussia Mönchengladbach. Both Geis and Malli were pivotal in performing Tuchel’s midfield pentagon and are now integral to the Mainz first-team.

SEE ALSO: Generation Next – Johannes Geis: another top youngster from German football’s talent factory

Tuchel to Dortmund: what to fix?

Although it is quite clichéd to suggest that managers always return to their former clubs to acquire new players, Tuchel will be tempted to return to the Coface Arena, chequebook in hand, to add energy to a Borussia Dortmund squad who appears jaded and worn-out by Klopp’s relentless gegenpressing.

Johannes Geis would offer the intelligent passing to compliment Nuri Sahin and Ilkay Gündogan in midfield, whilst arriving with knowledge of Tuchel’s pentagon system.

Die Schwarzgelben’s defence needs new faces regardless of whether Mats Hummels remains a BVB player and Stefan Bell could provide a cheap yet invaluable addition. The 23-year-old has enjoyed a season as one of the Bundesliga’s standout performers in central defence and would provide speed that has been lacking since injuries to Neven Subotic and a level of composure that Sokratis Papastathopoulos and Matthias Ginter fail to provide.

A n excellent tactician, Tuchel won’t need to be too reliant on the transfer market in order to assert his ideas. With fresh faces imminent due to a much needed shake-up of the playing staff at Signal Iduna Park, the emphasis will be on players who can quickly adapt to Tuchel’s systems and ideas.

With a reputation for previous astute dealings and an obsessive work ethic, Tuchel will be putting in serious hours of research that will enable him to hit the ground running come July 1st when his Dortmund tenure begins. With plenty of offers on the table, Tuchel and Borussia Dortmund looks to be the right match for the young coach to progress in his trade.

As a club that needs fresh impetus, Dortmund have employed a manager who isn’t afraid to make changes in order to succeed.

(main photo credit: matthias_spanrad via Flickr)