American manager Pellegrino Matarazzo will be managing in the German Bundesliga next season.
Despite a 3-1 loss to Darmstadt on Sunday in their 2. Bundesliga season finale, Stuttgart clinched their immediate return to the top-flight due to Heidenheim’s defeat to Arminia Bielefeld. Matarazzo will now have his first managing position in a top European league after being named Stuttgart manager in late December.
THIS TEAM ⚪️?
WE ARE BACK IN THE @Bundesliga_EN!!! ??? pic.twitter.com/MqtmjVjM0X
— VfB Stuttgart_int (@VfB_int) June 28, 2020
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“I’m proud of the lads,” Matarazzo said post match. “We had a lot of ups and downs during the second half of the season but we always managed to pick ourselves back up again. Everyone believed that we could achieve our goal and I think that this was a decisive factor. It was great for Mario to get another goal in his final match. It’s a shame that we ended up losing but first and foremost, we achieved what we had set out to do, and that’s reason enough for celebration.”
Stuttgart finished the season with 58 points and a 17-7-10 record overall with Matarazzo posting a 8-3-5 record in his stint as manager. The club finished three 10 points clear of league winners Arminia Bielefeld and three points ahead of the promotion playoff place, occupied by Heidenheim.
The 42-year-old New Jersey native was rewarded with a new two-year contract back in late May after impressing in his first senior managerial job. Matarazzo’s coaching career in Germany has also seen stops at Nuremberg and Hoffenheim as both a youth head coach and senior assistant coach.
Stuttgart’s Bundesliga campaign will begin in the Fall with Matarazzo hopefully keeping the club in the top-flight for a lengthy period.