“Not 100 percent satisfied”: Blau-Weiß Köln is aiming for Top 5
After the first half of the season, SC Blau-Weiß Köln is in seventh place in the district league. Coach Raoul Dia is not unhappy with this, but also not entirely satisfied. He hopes the team will continue to develop and still wants to die in the top five.
The fact that there are more important things than football is nothing new, but with the beginning of the corona pandemic, it should also have the very last words. But as worn out as the slogan may be, football is still the most beautiful thing in the world. Therefore Raoul Dia, Trainer of the SC Blau-Weiß Köln, also in line happy that the first ever will be played again.
It was just nice “to spend great Sundays on the pitch again, to have a lot of great training units and just to focus on football again after this really difficult time for our social life.” Because football has now arrived there again and Blau-Weiß Köln is in the first half of the season District League in seventh place. Dia can live with it, finally with him as a new coach and 15 new players, there was a big upheaval. But much more important: “We have found each other as a team and I think we’ve found each other again as a club.”
“Could be in a different place in the table”
In spite of everything, in the opinion of the coach, there would have been more possible: “In terms of football, we could be on a different place in the table and you have to say, I personally, and I know the boys too, are not 100 percent satisfied.” Dia describes his team as “strong playing”, the game with the ball has become much better and most of the games have been retained in terms of possession. The 45 goals scored are the second most in the league and are no coincidence.
“If you have a lot of possession in a league like this, you run the risk of getting into defensive transition phases,” the coach knows. It is important to work on the remaining defense and counterattacking, the Cologne team conceded too many goals – and that cost games. As an example, Dia leads the game against the VfL Rheingold survey in which blue-white gambled away a 2-0 lead and still lost 2: 3, all goals conceded fields by counter-attacks after corner kicks. “It’s been seldom that an opponent has been able to outplay us when we are defensively orderly.”
Developed individually and as a team
The positive thing, however, is that the development curve of the team and the individual players is pointing upwards: “We have improved both individually and as a team. We sometimes work with guys who did not play so well.” A good example is Julio Molongua, who already has experience in the district league, but never scored a particularly high number of goals. He currently leads the league with 19 goals from 16 games. “But everyone else also played a great half-series,” emphasizes Dia.
A semi-series that mainly coincides with that of the District Cup Finals or the second round of the Middle Rhine Cups against the Regional league team FC Wegberg-Beeck, but also with league games like the 4-1 against the FC Leverkusen or the 4: 3 against the SV Westhoven-Ensen had some highlights ready with two late goals to victory.
In the second half of the season, Dia would like to see the team improve in terms of football and in the four phases of the game. As many points as possible should jump out of it, the coach would like to be among the top five: “Then we can be very, very satisfied.” There will probably be only a few transfers in winter, the squad, which is deliberately broad-based due to Corona, is only to be reduced a little.
At the end of the year, it is also important to thank a few people. For example his team of co-trainers Jan Daley Bucket and goalkeeping coach Peter Gilges, but also the supervisor Helga Murrmann and the video analyst Shravant Gandhi. They all invest a lot of time in addition to the space. But there is a lot more: “I would like to emphasize that there are a lot of great people working in the association who fit in with the fact that we can be on the pitch every Sunday. The youth train, the stewards play, the admission controls and of course all the referees: all of these people, my very big thanks go to focus.