Marie-Louise Eta has grow to be the primary lady appointed to handle a males’s crew in one in all Europe’s prime 5 leagues after being named interim head coach of Bundesliga aspect Union Berlin.
Her appointment till the top of the season follows the dismissal of Steffen Baumgart, whose crew misplaced 3-1 to backside aspect FC Heidenheim on Saturday.
Union Berlin, who sit eleventh within the 18-team Bundesliga, are 11 factors away from the automated relegation zone with 5 matches remaining however have solely received twice in 14 league outings in 2026.
Eta, 34, is not any stranger to breaking boundaries, turning into the Bundesliga’s first feminine assistant coach, additionally with Union Berlin, in November 2023.
She deputised for then-manager Nenad Bjelica, who was serving a three-match suspension, throughout a 1-0 win over Darmstadt in January 2024 to grow to be the primary lady to guide a Bundesliga crew from the touchline.
Eta, a former Germany youth worldwide and Ladies’s Champions League winner with Turbine Potsdam, has been working as Union Berlin’s under-19s supervisor since July 2025 and can grow to be the membership’s girls’s head coach in the summertime.
“Now we have had a massively disappointing second half of the season and won’t enable ourselves to be blinded by our league place,” mentioned Horst Heldt, Union’s director of males’s soccer.
“Our scenario stays precarious. The performances proven in current weeks don’t give us confidence that we will flip issues round with the present set-up. Now we have due to this fact determined to make a contemporary begin.”
Eta pointed to the challenges she faces, with Union seven factors forward of St Pauli, who sit within the relegation play-off spot.
“Given the factors hole within the decrease half of the desk, our place within the Bundesliga isn’t but safe,” she mentioned.
“I’m delighted the membership has entrusted me with this difficult process. Considered one of Union’s strengths has all the time been, and stays, the power to drag collectively in such conditions.
“I’m satisfied that we’ll safe the essential factors.”
