There’s never a dull moment at third division club Rot-Weiss Essen. The events of the last few days show that.

The past few days have been turbulent for Rot-Weiss Essen, with it first becoming public that long-serving board boss Marcus Uhlig will leave Hafenstraße by the summer at the latest. CFO Sascha Peljhan is also stepping down, but will remain with the club as a lender and sponsor.

This was reported by Forecasting on Monday. One day later, RWE confirmed this news and officially introduced Uhlig’s successor Marc-Nicolai Pfeifer in a press release.

Naturally, Essen’s head coach Christoph Dabrowski, who was privy to the decisions, had also taken note of the news. On Thursday, the ex-professional said: “The club has told the team what has been made public. The team took it on board and trained as normal again. I was of course in open communication with all those responsible and was also privy to the processes”.

However, it was not only the personnel changes in the management team that were a defining topic for the Red & Whites, but also the situation of Felix Götze. The 26-year-old defender had to be taken off the pitch with a grumbling head, a laceration and a slight traumatic brain injury after a violent foul by Jakob Lemmer during the match in Dresden (2:2). He was given an unpleasant send-off by some of the Dynamo fans, which Götze shared on Instagram.

“Yesterday I cried for the first time in my soccer career. Not from pain, but because it was humiliating to be insulted, spat at and thrown at with a bleeding face and in shock. There are limits and unfortunately they were crossed yesterday,” said Götze.

Felix has all my support. Despite all the rivalry and pressure in a competition, it’s always about respect for the other person. Felix wanted to express that and it was appropriate.

Christoph Dabrowski

Dabrowski also commented on these incidents ahead of the home match against SpVgg Unterhaching (March 2, 4:30 p.m.): “I only noticed it in passing because I’m not on Instagram. Felix has all my support. Despite all the rivalry and pressure in a competition, it’s always about respect for the other person. Felix wanted to express that and it was appropriate. I’m a big supporter of that and can only agree with Felix.”

At one point last Saturday, Dabrowski was even the center of attention himself – in a positive sense. When Isaiah Young burst into tears due to his mistake that led to the 2:2, the Essen coach comforted his winger in the circle in front of the entire team

“In the position where Isi helped out the team in Dresden, you know that Isi is not at home in that position. He’s not a trained defender, but he put himself at the service of the team. He can actually defend the situation that leads to the goal without any problems. In the end, however, it’s about making mistakes together and ironing them out. Isi has made good progress again in recent weeks, has trained superbly this week and has the maximum confidence to go full throttle again in his usual position on Saturday,” explained the 45-year-old.

However, Dabrowski then made one thing clear with a grin: “Basically, we don’t have a team that is built close to tears. “