Sports director Dieter Hecking (58) is returning to the coaching bench after the separation from Markus Weinzierl and will be in charge of 1. FC Nürnberg, which is threatened with relegation, until the end of the season.

As Hecking announced at a press conference, U23 coach Cristian Fiel (42) will be his assistant. This is the "new constellation until the end of the season".

Chairman of the Supervisory Board Thomas Grethlein spoke of the "best solution" for the club in the current situation, but also called the additional job for Hecking a "risk". But he will "definitely only look after the FCN as a coach until the end of the season".

The traditional Franconian club parted ways with coach Weinzierl on the same day after just a few months. Hecking was last in charge of Hamburger SV as a coach until the summer of 2020. After that he became sports director in Nuremberg and had actually declared his coaching career to be over.

Weinzierl (48) only succeeded Robert Klauss on leave last October. He was initially able to stabilize the team defensively, but he was also unable to initiate an upswing. Weinzierl had previously looked after FC Augsburg, VfB Stuttgart and FC Schalke 04.

Concerns about staying up

In its current form, 1. FC Nürnberg must be very concerned about staying up in the league. The crisis team is 13th in the table with 22 points, but the advantage over relegation rank 16 is only two points. Next Saturday, FCN will receive the bottom of the table from Sandhausen in a crisis duel.

"We have to pull ourselves together quickly in the week to straighten that out against Sandhausen. We're the ones who have to move even closer together to achieve better results," Hecking had demanded after the disaster in Heidenheim. "We don't need to discuss the fact that the fans aren't satisfied, I agree with them. We owe it to them."