A Karlsruher SC dream

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Karlsruhe Sport-Club

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Here we go again after the bitterly disappointing unfinished end to my other story we go again hopefully with a more better fuller ending this time around. This time I have stepped away from better known leagues and went random and went for Karlsruhe SC currently plying their trade in 2. Bundesliga in Germany.

Karlsruhe SC officially came into existence in 1952 due to a merging of KFC Phoenix and VfB Mühlburg to form the club in its full title of Karlsruhe Sport-Club Mühlburg-Phonix e. V., but had been in exist since 1894 but existed in various forms and guises.
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The club's stadium, the Wildparkstadion holds a modest 29699 people.
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Moving on to the club itself we have three teams with the first team in 2.Bundesliga, u19s playing in the German under 19s Group 2and Karlsruhe SC II's playing in the German Lower Division Baden-Wurttemberg.

Below is the follow squads we have to contend with for the upcoming season.
Karlsruhe 1st Team
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u19's
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Karlsruhe 2nd Team
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Facilities wise the cub is doing well for themselves with some good training and youth facilities to allow us to promote from within as money wise the club is not in great shape.
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Last update before going into the season is the clubs goals for the season. The board itself is have set the club a goal of a top half finish in the league while making at least the 2nd round in the German Cup.
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Transfer wise the club has seen both incomings and outgoings at the club. We seen 3 new players join the club permanently whilst also bringing someone in on loan. Moritz Rieble is a youth prospect that joins the club and immediately goes into the u19's. Timon Frohlich also comes in on a free and will provide cover and potential competition for the right back at the club. Antonio Puertas joins the club from Almeria and will provide competition for an attacking midfield role at the club. Lastly David Sauerland comes in on loan from Dortmund to provide backup for midfield.
In regards to outgoings we lost Enrico Valentini to Derby for 2.6 million euro and also lost back up left back Dennis Kempe to Stuttgart for 325k euro initially with the potential to rise to 450k. Martin Stoll also left to join Aue on loan for the season.
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Preseason + August 2016

So here we go preseason football see what the teams like and see what we'll be expecting from the upcoming season as we aim for the best.

Preseason
We started off with a home game against Dutch side Roda JC and we came out with a 5-2 victory, we followed that up with a 2-1 win against Wiener SK in our tour of Austria. We then faced Deportivo La Coruna next and lost out 5-2 as we rotated the side and tactics, we finished our tour of Austria with a 5-0 victory over Eppingen. We returned home to Germany and suffered back to back 3-0 loses to both Dortmund and Leverkusen as we scheduled some money makers before finishing preseason with a 5-1 victory over CfR Pforzheim.

League Action
First game of a brand new season we visited Aue and came home with a 4-1 win thanks to goals from Meffert, Thoelke, Reese and Diamantakos. Next up we face Wurzburg and Reese, Diamantakos, Yamada and Torres all got themselves on the score sheet as we won 4-1 again before we lost 2-1 to St Pauli as Torres got a late equaliser. We welcomed Sandhausen the Wolfparkstadion and we lost out again this time 1-0 as we conceded a late penalty. Final game of the month saw us visit Hannover as we won 2-0 thanks to goals from Yamada and Diamantakos. This left us in the first month in 4th place on 9 points after 5 games with Bochum currently leading the way on 12 points.

German Cup Action
In the first round of the German Cup we faced off against Germania Egestorf and we came away with a 4-1 victory thanks to a hat-rick from Diamantakos and Rolim getting on the score sheet. We have been drawn at home to Dortmund in the 2nd round of the cup.

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September - October 2016

Moving on after a decent start to the season we get into the busy months as we aim to move up the table and attempt a fight for promotion.

Cup Action
After the first round victory over Germania Egestorf we were paired with Dortmund at home in the 2nd round. The game started well as we took the lead through Torres before Dortmund hit back and went in at half time with a 2-1 lead thanks to goals from Mor and Aubameyang. Second half started well as we almost immediately drew level with Diamantakos getting the equaliser as we struck on the counter as he collected a long punt forward from a Dortmund corner and that was it as we went to extra time. Things got a lot better as Dortmund went down to 10 men through injury and we took advantage as Diamantakos scored 2 more in we took the game by the horns and opened up a 4-2 lead before Kilian scored on the stroke of half time to peg us back to 4-3 but that was the end of it as we progressed 4-3. This set up a 3rd round tie with Bielefeld.

League Action
September
September started off with a 1-0 victory over Munchen Lions thanks to a winner from Barry, we followed this up with a 2-2 with Dammfield with a late goal from Puertas and a own goal to get us the draw late on. We finished the month with a 2-0 victory over Bielefeld with Barry and Rolim securing the victory before we lost 2-1 to Greuther Furth as they struck late after Hoffer had equalised. This left us in 4th position in the league early on just outside the promotion places.

October
We started the month off with a 1-0 defeat against Bochum before following it up with 0-0 draw at Dusseldorf. Things didn't get much better as we struggled to 2-1 defeat to Heidenheim with Yamada getting nothing more than a consolation goal and we finished the month with a 2-0 defeat to Kaiserslautern as we were completely outplayed. These results saw us dropped down the table as we finished the month in 10th.
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Other News
Shortly after joining the club I had news that there would soon be an election and indeed it did take place in October and the club saw Danny Muller elected president succeeding Ingo Wellenreuther. Of course this saw my position at the club under no threat at all but it does mean that there will be no plans for any kind of investment in the near future which is slightly disappointing.
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November - January 2017

After a very disappointing October we have to move on and buck up our ideas or the season could turn into a struggle.

League Action
November
We started the month against Stuttgart and lost out 3-1 with Torres getting on the scoresheet but turned into nothing more than a consolation goal as we were outplayed going for the win. Things did take a turn as we followed it up with a 2-2 draw against Braunschweig with Diamantakos netting a double and we followed this up with a 2-0 win against Dresden as Yamada and Diamantakos got themselves on the scoresheet. These left us in 13th place in the league as we try and improve on our position.

December
December was a different month as we went unbeaten winning 2 and drawing 1 before we went for the Winter break. We started off the month with a 2-1 victory over Nurnberg with Barry netting a double to get us the victory. We followed this up with a 2-2 draw at Aue with Torres and Barry getting on the scoresheet before we finished the month off with a 2-1 win at Wurzburg thanks to goals from Puertas and Diamantakos. This left us in 7th place as we finished the year off and broke off for Winter.

January
January only saw play 1 game as we got back to action with a 1-1 draw against St Pauli with Diamantakos giving us the lead before Kyoung-Rok equalised just after half time but we couldn't find a breakthrough. This saw us drop to 9th place in the league.

Winter Friendlies
With the players having 2 weeks off over Christmas we welcomed them back in January and we organised a few friendlies to get them back in shape. We started off with a friendly against Stuttgart and lost out 3-2 as Barry and Puertas getting the goals before we followed this up with a 2-1 victory over Dortmund thanks to goals from Yamada and Diamantakos secured the victory. We continued with a 3-2 win against Frankfurt Erlenbruch with Puertas, Kinsombi and Zawada getting on the scoresheet before finishing the Winter break with a 3-2 defeat against Dammfeld with Kinsombi and Zawada getting on the scoresheet again.
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Transfers
The January transfer window was quiet enough as we saw 2 incomings, one permanently and one on loan while we saw one leave the club permanently. First up we saw Erwin Hoffer leave the club to join Osmanlispor for 1.3 million euros whilst Steffen Lang joined the club for 240k from Bielefeld to strengthen our fullback positions as he can play both left and right back. Lastly Harry Wilson joined on loan from Liverpool to provide competition for the attacking midfield roles at the club.
 
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Feb - May 2017

So moving into a new year I've discovered a load of things about the team namely we've a squad of bottlers...

Cup Action
So after managing to progress past Dortmund in the second round we will face off against Bielefeld in the third round. The game started off fantastically as we led after 4 minutes through a Figueras goal before Diamantakos doubled the lead and Puertas got his name on the scoresheet just before half time to give us a 3-0 lead. The 2nd half was a quieter half as Puertas got another goal as he picked himself up and put away a penalty to give us a 4-0 lead before Putaro scored a consolation goal for Bielefeld as we progressed to the Quarter Final with a 4-1 victory.
The Quarter Final saw us face off against RB Leipzig and it was the end of the line for ourselves as we lost 4-2. The game itself started dreadfully as we fell behind after 3 minutes to Selke before Diamantakos equalised for us before Leipzig took the lead again through Selke and Burke got on the scoresheet as we went into the second half 3-1 down. Going into the 2nd half we got back in the game as Diamantakos netted his second goal to leave the game evenly poised at 3-2 before Leipzig sealed the win thanks to a goal from Upamecano.

League Action
February
the month began with a 1-1 draw with Sandhausen as Vujinovic got himself on the scoresheet but we couldn't secure the win. We followed this up with a 3-2 defeat against Hannover as Diamantakos netted 2 goals as we lost out a tight game before we got hammered 3-0 by Munchen Lions. We ended the month with a 1-1 draw at Dammfeld as Figueras got himself on the scoresheet but we played 88 minutes with 10 men as Promel saw red after 2 minutes.

March
We opened the month with 2 back to back 1-0 defeats against both Bielefeld and Greuther Furth before we got back to winning ways and the first win in 7 games as we won 1-0 against Bochum thanks to a goal from Barry to seal the win. This left us in 11th place in the league.

April
April was a dreadful month again as we start off with a 2-0 defeat against Dusseldorf before following it up with a 5-3 defeat against Heidenheim despite being 3-1 up with 30 minutes to go as Puertas netted a double and Barry also scored. We followed these defeats up with a 0-0 draw against Kaiserslautern and a 3-2 victory over Stuttgart as Barry scored and Diamantakos netted a double. We ended the month with a 4-1 defeat against Braunschweig as Diamantakos scored what proved to be nothing more than a consolation goal.

May
With the end of the season in sight we still had 2 more games to go and started off with a 2-1 defeat against Dresden in the penultimate game as Torres opening the scoring before we conceded twice in the last 15 minutes to lose out. Our final game of the saw us draw 0-0 against Nurnberg to leave in 14th place on 39 points as we ended a disappointing season.
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Youth Intake
We had our first youth intake and to be honest it was a very good one for the club as we had a few good players come in with plenty potential.
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2016/17 Season Review

So here we are at the end of the season. It was a mixed season with joy in the cup as we made it to the quarter final before being put out by eventual winners Leipzig whilst in the league after a decent start we really really struggled after the Winter break as we ended up towards the just about safe from the relegation playoff.
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The season ended with Nurnberg taking the title and Dusseldorf the runners up as they gained automatic promotion whilst Greuther Furth also joined them in 1. Bundesliga as they beat Freiburg in the promotion playoff. At the other end of the Sandhausen and Bielefeld were relegated to 3. Bundesliga whilst Wurzburg faced off against Wehen for a place in 2. Bundesliga as Wurzburg retained their position in 2. Bundesliga.

Moving onto the awards and first up we have Fans Player of the Year and Diamantakos deservedly took the award with 45% of the vote whilst Thoelke and Torres joined him the top 3. Torres took home the Goal of the Season whilst Puertas took home the Signing of the season. Last up Diamantakos took home the Young Player of the Year as well which was well deserved with 22 goals and 7 assists last season.
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Moving on to the commercial view the club has performed well considering our size as the main contribution from our cup run and final league position. Going into next season we have a new main kit sponsor generating an additional 0.4 million on our last sponsor. Last up the top 5 best selling shirts from last season was no surprise as Diamantakos claiming the best selling shirt.
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Last but not least we had some breaking news at the end of June after months of protesting the 2022 World Cup has been moved from Qatar to Argentina.
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Preseason - September 2017

Here we go into another season and hopefully a better one after the disappointing end to the season last year. We've strengthened the team and improved the staff at the club.

Preseason
Preseason went well as we stayed at home this time around and it went as well as expected as all players involved got plenty of minutes on the pitch. We started off with two 2-0 defeats against both Bayern and Dortmund in our money raisers before winning 5-2 against RB Salzburg and a 7-1 win against SV Reid. We then faced off against BMG and drew 2-2 before losing out 1-0 to Freiburg and losing out in a close game 3-2 against Augsburg. Our last game of preseason was against Chiasso as we ended it on a winning note as we came out 2-0 winners.

Transfers
The summer was a busy couple of months as the club saw plenty of new faces and seen others leave. We saw 10 players join the club for a total outlay of 2 million euros with only 8 players coming in on frees and Daniel Nesseler joining the club for 1.8 million and Bruno Lamas coming in for a modest 245 thousand euro. Nathaniel Amaoo joined the club as a prearranged transfer when I took over from Freiburg on a free, Key outgoings were Manual Torres who wanted out after the end of the season and Jordi Figeuras as well after the disappointing end. Moritz Stoppelkamp left as I could guarantee him game time while Rene Vollath also left after taking a strop over not getting double his wage and refusing to sign a new contract.
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German Cup Action
Here we go for another potential cup run as we face off against Saar 05 in the first round in the cup. We made some changes to the team and it didn't hamper us at all as we won 4-0 thanks to goals from both Barry and Zelalem whislt Vujinovic netted a double to road off the victory. We progressed to the 2nd round and will face off against Hertha Berlin for a place in the 3rd round.

This did crack me up as well.
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League Action
July
The season started early this year as we played our first league game towards the end of July as the season started off against Braunschweig and we started off with a 3-2 victory thanks to a double from Diamantakos and a late winner from Promel. Our next and final game of the month saw us face off against Freiburg and lost out 3-1 with Diamantakos against getting on the score sheet. We ended the month in 11th place after a slightly disappointing start.

August
August was a completely different month as we played 3 league games and remaining unbeaten winning all 3 games. We started off with a 2-0 win over Bochum as Vujinovic and Barry got the goals late on to win us the match, we followed this up with a 3-2 win over Heidenheim as we went 3-1 up thanks to goals from Lamas, Thoelke and Vujinovic before they made it 3-2 in the 82nd minute to give us a nervy end to the game. We ended the month with a 4-1 victory over Frankfurt Erlenbruch as Barry got himself on the score sheet before Diamantakos netted himself a hat rick to seal the win to leave us in 4th at the end of the month.

September
September was another good month to follow on as we again remained unbeaten but did drop points. We started off with a 1-1 draw against Inglostadt as Diamantakos gave us the lead before Hinterseer equalised, we followed this up with a 2-1 win over Kaiserslautern as Lamas and Diamantakos gave us the lead before Musel scored in the 77 minutes to set up a nervy end to the game. We then welcomed Hannover and prevailed as 4-1 winners as Zelalem, Diamantakos, Sallahi and Barry all got on the score sheet for us. We ended the month with a 1-0 win over Wurzburg thanks to a Diamantakos goal and a 2-0 win over Bremen thanks to a Puertas double. This left us top of the pile after the first 10 games on 25 points 2 clear over Sttutgart.
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We lost Thoelke as well to a broken leg after the Hannover game which will see him being out for anywhere between 6-7 months.
 
October - December 2017

As the season rumbles on so do we as we continue to look up the table and maybe aim for promotion! We're going strong in the league and moving on through the cup!

German Cup Action
Moving on after out win against Saar 05 we faced off against Hertha Berlin in the 2nd round. The second round tie got off to a cracker thanks to a second minute goal from Diamantakos before he again got on the score sheet to give us a 2-0 lead after 16 minutes. It was plain sailing until the 63rd minute with Kalou got a goal back to leave it at 2-1 and that was it as we ended the game 2-1 and we progressed to the 3rd round to play Nurnberg. In the third round we face off against Nurnberg and it was a tight affair altogether. The game itself had very few chances as we the game grinded to finish as it finished goalless and we went into extra time. It didn't end well for us as Nurnberg took the lead after the 99th minute through Ajeti and that was it as the game finished 1-0 in Nurnberg's favour as our German Cup journey ended.

League Action
October
Picking up were we left off in the league and it started badly as we lost out 2-0 to Stuttgart, before following it up with 3-0 win against Paderborn thanks to a double from Puertas and Lamas getting on the score sheet as well. The month ended with a 4-2 win over Munchen Lions as Diamantakos netted all four goals as we lead 4-0 before an Echaide own goal and a Boya last minute consolation. This put us into pole position early on for promotion as we topped the table.

November
November started off were October left off as we opened up with a 3-1 win thanks to a double from Sallahi and Barry also got on the scoresheet to secure the win. We followed this up with a 4-2 win over Dammfeld as Lamas netted a double and Barry and Puertas also got themselves on the score sheet to secure the win. We ended the month with a 3-1 win over St Pauli as Nesseler, Echaide and Diamantakos all got on the score sheet as we maintained our position at the top of the pile.

December
We opened up December with a 2-1 win against Aue as Diamantakos got a double with a goal either side of Skenderovic who had equalised for Aue. Next up we faced out against Braunschweig as we lost 2-1 despite taking the lead through Diamantakos before Nyman scored a double to give Braunschweig the win. We finished the month off and the year with a 2-0 win over Freiburg thanks to goals from Puertas and Lamas to cement our place at the top of the table and open up a 5 point gap over Sttutgart.
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Other Announcements
A year and half into the job we're doing well as a team and it shows. During the last months I have been invited for numerous interviews as it began with Birmingham and Hannover asking me to attend interviews in November. In December I was invited to interviews with QPR, Cardiff and Leeds and all of which I declined.
 
Jan - March 2018

So here we go into a new year, plenty of time to go but well up there at the business end of the league but can we maintain it?

Winter Friendlies
As the year ended we went into the Winter break and we took that opportunity to organise 3 friendlies over the course of the break. First up we played CfR Pforzheim and won 4-0 before following this up with a 5-0 defeat to Bayern Munich. We ended the break with a 2-0 victory of CSKA Moscow which left us ready for the 2nd half of the season.

League Action
January + February
So we're back to the league and the first game of the year saw us visit Bochum where we drew 1-1 thanks to a late equaliser from Vujinovic. Moving into February we started off with a 1-1 draw at Heidenheim with Barry getting on the score sheet before following up with a 1-0 win over Frankfurt Erlenbruch thanks to another goal from Barry. The month ended with 3 defeats in a row as we lost 3-0 against Inglostadt before following this up with a 1-0 defeat against Kaiserslautern. We ended the month with a 2-1 defeat against Hannover as Rodriguez netted a consolation.

March
We did get back on track in March as we opened the month with a 3-0 victory over Wurzburg thanks to a double from Dybal and Gotz getting on the score sheet, next up we defeated Bremen 2-0 thanks to a double from Vujinovic. We faced off against title rivals Stuttgart but lost out 2-1 as Vujinovic got on the score sheet again. We ended the month with a cracking 5-1 win over Paderborn as Vujinovic and Lamas both got doubles while Promel also got his name on the score sheet. This saw us top of the table with 5 games to go.
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Transfer Action
The worst transfer window I've ever had in any save. I didn't have any pressing need to buy as all positions were adequately filled and no need to sell as we money in the bank but naw our glorious chairman decided to sell our best two players in Bader and Diamantakos for pittance. Bader left 4 days before the end of the window and I just about got Gotz signed as a replacement before the window closed and Diamantakos left on deadline day and I had no other viable options to sign.
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Other Announcements
After the diabolical actions of the chairman I did give consideration to all the job interviews I received over the last 3 months. Bristol City came in and offered an interview at the start of January, WBA came offering then February as well. Wolves and Fulham then also offered interviews in March and which all were declined.
 
2017/18 end of Season run in

So here we go last few games of the season and everything is in the balance as we try to gain promotion to 1.Bundesliga.

League Action
April
April started with a bang as we faced on against Munchen Lions and won 3-1 as Lamas scored a double and Vujinovic also got on the score sheet. We followed this up with a 2-2 draw against Dresden as Puertas and Lamas gave us a 2-1 lead before we conceded a 88th minute equaliser. The month ended with a 3-2 defeat against Dammfeld as we were 2-2 thanks to goals from Vujinovic and Sallahi before Promel was sent off as we conceded in the 87th minute to lose the game which then saw us drop into 2nd place in the league.

May
May itself was a disastrous month as we opened up with a 1-0 defeat against St Pauli before losing 4-0 to Aue in the final game of the season as we dropped out of the automatic promotion places altogether and had to settle for the playoffs. The playoffs saw us face off against Dusseldorf and in the first leg we won 2-1 thanks to a late double from Vujinovic but unfortunately we couldn't repeat the result as we lost out 2-1 in the 2nd leg with Barry getting the goal to take the tie into extra time. In extra time we went down to 10 men as Kinsombi was sent off as we then lost out 4-3 on penalties as Lamas, Sallahi and Nesselar all netted and Puertas and Barry missed as we spend another year in 2.Bundesliga.
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Other Announcements
We also had the youth intake back in March and it was another decent enough intake for ourselves as we got some good prospects in to hopefully nurture and bring into the first team in the next season or two. The standout player of the intake was Markus Niebauer.
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In April I was also offered an interview the vacant Millwall job in April and Bremen came back looking again as well but both were duly declined.
 
2017/18 Season Review

So here we are at the end of another season which ended so disappointingly after a good start as we threw away a lead at the top of the table to finish 3rd and then lose out in the play offs on penalties to Dusseldorf, while we also lost out in the 3rd round of the German Cup to Nurnberg
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Stuttgart eventually won the league whilst Freiburg pipped us into second place to go up automatically, whilst at the other end of the table Paderborn and Frankfurt Erlenbruch were relegated whilst Wurzburg defeated Kiel to preserve their status in the league.

Next up we have the seasonal awards and it was Ylli Sallahi who took the FPOTY with 74% of the vote while Boubacar Barry was the runner up and Bruno Lamas topped off the top 3. Sallahi also took home the YPOTY award whilst Bruno Lamas took home Goal of the Season and Gedion Zelalem was awarded signing of the season.
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Finishing off we have the commercial summary and it was all good for the club as with the transfer and prize money the club has now become debt free as they've managed to pay off the remaining debt at the club. Corporate and hospitality along with match day commercial income also saw a rise whilst sponsorship and tv money due to going out in the 3rd round of the Cup saw a downturn. Barry was the top selling shirt of the season with Puertas, Zelalem, Sallahi and Lamas making up the top 5.
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End of the line

So its the end of the line as manager of Karlsruhe as after a disastrous start to the season winning only 3 games along with drawing 3 as well and losing the other 8 I have been sacked with the team in 17th place in the league.
 
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