{"id":49268,"date":"2026-04-18T21:54:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-18T16:24:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/?p=49268"},"modified":"2026-04-18T21:55:18","modified_gmt":"2026-04-18T16:25:18","slug":"union-berlin-lose-1-2-to-wolfsburg-in-marie-louise-etas-historic-debut-as-bundesligas-first-female-coach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/football\/bundesliga\/union-berlin-lose-1-2-to-wolfsburg-in-marie-louise-etas-historic-debut-as-bundesligas-first-female-coach\/","title":{"rendered":"Union Berlin lose 1-2 to Wolfsburg in Marie-Louise Eta\u2019s historic debut as Bundesliga\u2019s first female coach"},"content":{"rendered":"<p dir=\"auto\">In a landmark moment for European football, <strong>Marie-Louise Eta<\/strong> became the first woman to serve as head coach in any of Europe\u2019s \u201cBig Five\u201d leagues. The 34-year-old took charge of 1. FC Union Berlin for the first time on Saturday, but her debut ended in a narrow 2-1 home loss to VfL Wolfsburg at the Stadion An der Alten F\u00f6rsterei.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"auto\">Eta, who stepped up from her role with Union\u2019s Under-19 team after Steffen Baumgart\u2019s dismissal last week, will lead the men\u2019s first team for the remainder of the 2025\/26 season before transitioning to coach the club\u2019s women\u2019s side. Her appointment marks a significant breakthrough: she had already become the first female assistant coach in Bundesliga history in 2023 and the first woman to take charge of a men\u2019s Bundesliga match (as a stand-in) in 2024.<\/p>\n<h4 dir=\"auto\">A Tough Debut Against a Struggling Wolfsburg<\/h4>\n<p dir=\"auto\">Despite the historic occasion, the result did not go Union Berlin\u2019s way. Patrick Wimmer gave the visitors the lead in the 11th minute, and Dzenan Pejcinovic doubled Wolfsburg\u2019s advantage shortly after halftime. Oliver Burke pulled one back for the hosts in the 86th minute, but Union could not find a late equaliser.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"auto\">The defeat came against a Wolfsburg side that had gone <strong>12 matches without a win<\/strong> prior to this game, highlighting the unpredictable nature of football. Union Berlin remain in 11th place and relatively safe from relegation, but the result means they will need to pick up points in the final four fixtures to secure their Bundesliga status mathematically.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"auto\">Attendance was 22,012 \u2014 a strong turnout that showed the fans\u2019 support for both the team and this pioneering moment in the sport.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a landmark moment for European football, Marie-Louise Eta became the first woman to serve as head coach in any\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":217,"featured_media":49269,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4654],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bundesliga"],"reading_time":"2 min read","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/217"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49268"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49271,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49268\/revisions\/49271"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49269"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}