Things weren’t going so well for KFC Uerdingen in the Oberliga Niederrhein, but they managed to pull off an upset in the cup. Marcus John says his team has taken a “big step”.

With numerous notable new signings over the summer, KFC Uerdingen were the big favorites to win the Oberliga Niederrhein. However, the newly assembled team took quite a while to gel at the beginning.

However, the Krefeld team is now doing well and has advanced to fourth place thanks to a winning streak of seven games – although the gap to the leaders Baumberg is already nine points. In the Forecasting interview, Marcus John, coach and sporting director at KFC, looks back on the developments of the past six months and explains what will be important in the new year.

Marcus John on…

… the first half of the season: We had 16 new players and initially had a very, very hard time. The integration took a little longer than I had planned for myself. In the first three, four, five games we had, not everyone was ready yet, because of course we also had to sign players late due to injuries. If you compare the first few games with the last ones, you can see how many personnel changes we made to get the wins. It’s not always about the people, but about the line-up. We’ve made a big step there.

Img – Points Table

.. the best moment of the season so far: That was definitely the 1-0 after extra time in the Niederrheinpokal against MSV Duisburg. That’s how it can go when everyone sticks to the tactical plan. That was perhaps the turning point that allowed us to stabilize and put together a good series. We did lose to Sonsbeck, but then we won seven in a row. We also had other good games, for example, we turned the games against Straelen and Meerbusch around to win 4:3, which is quite an achievement. The 1:0 win against Ratingen was also a very, very good performance from us. These are the games where you see the team’s true strength, but only when everyone gives 100 percent.

… the worst moments: The games in Sonsbeck (0-1, editor’s note) and Hilden (0-2, editor’s note) were not good. I felt there was far too little commitment. We didn’t build up any pressure, those were forgettable games….

the goals for 2024: I will have one-on-one meetings with all the players and compare performance and expectations. Then there will definitely be one or two players who might approach us because they hoped for more playing time that we can’t give them. Then we’ll have to see how we can come together. In terms of sport, we naturally want to score more points in the second half of the season than in the first half, because we needed a lot of time and left points behind in the first third in particular. We also need to stabilize against the supposedly weaker teams. We’re getting wins against Schonnebeck, Ratingen and Straelen, but of course they don’t mean much if you then lose points against St. Tönis or Büderich, as we did in the first half of the season.