Union president calls for reset in effort to become top club again

Union Berlin president Dirk Zingler has said the team over-performed in the past successful years and that a reset is needed amid the current difficult season.

Union were promoted into the Bundesliga in 2019 and rose steadily up to fourth place last season to qualify for the Champions League for the first time.

But this season they went 16 games without victory from late August to early December, lost all six Champions League matches, and placed 15th in the Bundesliga are only just above the danger zone.

"Staying in the top flight, 40 points is our goal every year, and let's be happy about how great the last few years have been," Zingler said in an interview with the club website.

"We agree that we have over-performed in relation to our resources and our structure. We didn't always play our opponents into the ground, we rather fought them to death."

Zingler gave no real reason for the struggles this term but dismissed suggestions that summer signings like Kevin Volland and Leonardo Bonucci were not really the right men for the club.

"We haven't changed anything at all. Instead, we've brought in great guys who play a great role in the dressing room and a great role on the pitch," Zingler said, insisting that they can't be blamed "that we have lost our naturalness."

Zingler warned that the return to becoming a top team again could be a long process, naming a better integration of academy players as one measure for the future.

"We will see changes in the squad. We will have to reorganise ourselves, we will have to make a fresh start. We have many issues that we have not pursued as intensively as we should have in recent years for good reasons," Zingler said.