Delight at Lukas Kwasniok’s dismissal? Said El Mala causes a stir at 1. FC Köln

At 7.08 pm, the Cologne-based club announced Kwasniok’s suspension via their social media channels. Two minutes later, El Mala posted a video on his channels showing him celebrating a goal with Ragnar Ache. 

Several teammates, including Luca Waldschmidt – who was dropped from the squad by Kwasniok at the start of the year – liked the post. Denis Huseinbasic, who had barely featured under Kwasniok recently, even commented on the post: “Bravo, mate!”, he wrote.

As reported by Sport Bild, the agents of several star players had already approached sporting director Thomas Kessler on multiple occasions in recent months to discuss the problems between parts of the squad and Kwasniok. Kessler, however, stood by his manager until he finally pulled the plug after just two points from the last three games and only two wins since the start of the year.

The relationship between El Mala and Kwasniok, in particular, had visibly deteriorated over the course of the season. Despite the 19-year-old’s significant impact in attack, Kwasniok had often used him only as a substitute in the first half of the season – much to the bewilderment of the club’s own fans. “I’m Said’s teammate, not his fan,” Kwasniok had said in January, for example, explaining that El Mala was “not yet ready” to start every game. He therefore wanted to let the youngster make the difference from the bench.

“We had our best run of form this season when we focused on starting matches against teams in such a way that we worked our way through the game and got players onto the pitch who were capable of doing the dirty work, and then, towards the end, with a few more creative players on the pitch, we could decide the games in our favour. That was the thinking," said Kwasniok elsewhere regarding the dubious "demotion" of his "artist", which had a very detrimental effect on El Mala at international level.

For national team coach Julian Nagelsmann followed Kwasniok’s narrative and explicitly referred to it in a much-discussed interview in kicker – and what, in his opinion, distinguished him from Lennart Karl at Bayern Munich.

“There’s a difference between being at Bayern and being at Cologne. He simply needs to get more playing time at Cologne,” Nagelsmann clarified: “And this message isn’t directed at Lukas Kwasniok, because I’ve come to know him as a coach who closely observes what his team needs, including in defence. Said must have the ambition to be a first-team regular at Cologne and to play consistently. But he’s playing 50 per cent of the time, which isn’t enough. And that’s not down to the manager, as people often assume, but down to him himself – how consistently he performs in defence.”

El Mala consequently missed out on a place in the final DFB squad ahead of this summer’s World Cup, even though he had racked up the same number of points (14) as Karl – who is now set to make his DFB debut – but had done so in six fewer matches. It was partly thanks to El Mala’s goals that Kwasniok, who had faced criticism from the fanbase early in the season, was able to hold on to his job for a little longer. 

El Mala scored against both HSV and in the derby against Borussia Mönchengladbach. However, this did not result in a win, which is why Kwasniok has now had to step down. Assistant manager Rene Wagner is taking over on an interim basis and is tasked with preventing Effzeh from being relegated straight away. After the international break, Cologne face Eintracht Frankfurt. 

Meanwhile, the hopes of the German U21s will rest on El Mala as they face two tough matches in the European Championship qualifiers against Northern Ireland and Greece. A change of scenery could then be on the cards for the super-talent this summer. Recently, reports have been mounting that El Mala will then move to Brighton & Hove Albion in the Premier League.