Matches of the month: Two new brooms sweep clean
The coach for the 1993/94 season as announced in January 1993. Dragoslav Stepanovic is expected to bring the "atmosphere of the circus" (Reiner Calmund) under the Bayer Cross.
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Before that, 'Stepi' has the job of taking Eintracht Frankfurt to the title as the team from Hessen are second in the table one point behind Bayern Munich. Bayer 04 Leverkusen under coach Reinhard Saftig are sixth and on course for the UEFA Cup and also in the DFB Cup semi-final against Eintracht Frankfurt. Following a 3-0 defeat against the Werkself in the semi-final on 30 March 1993, Dragoslav Stepanovic ends his time at Eintracht Frankfurt. A couple of weeks later Bayer 04 produce a tame performance on matchday 29 in a 2-0 defeat away to Dynamo Dresden but are in fifth place in the table with very decent results in the weeks before. The next day, 2 May 1993, general manager Reiner Calmund calls an emergency meeting with coach Saftig and the team committee and decides to appoint Dragoslav Stepanovic with immediate effect.
Monday was actually a day off but there was a round-robin call on Sunday evening with the message of "Training Monday afternoon." Stepi gets going. Monday afternoon, twice on Tuesday, twice on Wednesday, twice on Thursday and another training session on Friday – and then the game against FC Köln at the Ulrich Haberland Stadium on Saturday 8 May. Any argument for reducing the intensity of training evaporates after 15 seconds when Andreas Thom sets up Ulf Kirsten to make it 1-0. The game ends in a 3-0 victory and the training sessions continue in the same vein in the following weeks: Once on Mondays, twice on Tuesdays, twice on Wednesdays, twice on Thursdays, once on Fridays, matches on Saturdays, once on Sundays. The Werkself gain eight out of a possible ten points in the last five games to secure a UEFA Cup slot and win the DFB Cup for the one and only time to date.
2003: relegation narrowly avoided
Ten years later, the Werkself players are up to their necks in it. Thomas Hörster replaces the coach of the previous season Klaus Toppmöller in February 2003. But there is no sign of redemption. With two games to play, Bayer 04 are in a relegation position of sixteenth on 34 points, two points away from safety. At the post-match press conference after the 4-1 defeat away to Hamburg SV, coach Thomas Hörster expresses himself unfortunately but honestly: "I've lost hope that we can still win two matches after this game." So, general manager Reiner Calmund decides to bring the coach just sacked by FC Nürnberg and former Bayern player Klaus Augenthaler to Leverkusen.
His job is to turn things around in the remaining two games. And he achieves that with two wins. 17 May 2003 brings the home game against 1860 Munich. The Werkself win 3-0 with an emotional and focus performance. The threat of relegation is finally blown away on the final matchday with a 1-0 win at FC Nürnberg.
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