Less than 24 hours ago the bookmakers had Mike Phelan the odds-on favourite to be the new Wigan Athletic manager. Uwe Rösler is now quoted between 1/6 and 1/8 for the job.
With Latics in a downward spiral, after losing again at Leeds on Wednesday, Whelan is keen to get the new appointment finalized quickly.
Rösler has just been awarded the Sky Bet League 1 Manager of the Month for November. Brentford went unbeaten through November, with four clean sheets in five matches.
Uwe Rösler and his assistant Alan Kernaghan played together for Manchester City, during the mid 1990s. Rösler was a stylish centre forward and Kernaghan a central defender.
Originating from East Germany, Rösler played for leading clubs Lokomotiv and Chemie of Leipzig, Magdeburg and Dynamo Dresden. In 1992, at the age of 24, he went to Nurnburg in West Germany, but found the transition from east to west difficult. Rösler was unable to score in 28 appearances. The following year he went back to Dresden on loan.
Rösler’s career was to take off in 1994 when he joined Manchester City, where he made 150 appearances scoring 50 goals. He left City to go back to Germany in 1998, where he had brief spells at Kaiserslautern and Borussia Tennis Berlin. A return to England with Southampton and West Bromwich in 2000-2002 was to be followed by a brief stay at Munich’s third club, Unterhacching.
In 2002 Rösler first moved to Norway. He went to Lillestrøm, a small town north of Oslo. His stay as a player was cut short by chest cancer, which he successfully fought. Rosler took over as manager of Lillestrøm in 2004 and was to stay there for a couple of years before moving to the oil city of Stavanger in the south west. He stayed with local club Viking for three years before joining Molde on the west coast on a short term contract, during which he saved them from relegation.
Rösler took over at Brentford in June 2011. Last year Brentford were in third place in League 1 on the last day of the season. They needed to beat Doncaster to get automatic promotion. With the scores at 0-0 and in the 90th minute Brentford got a penalty, which they missed as the ball hit the crossbar. Doncaster immediately went to the other end to score the winning goal. Brentford were beaten in the playoff final by Yeovil.
Uwe Rösler is a fascinating character who has been through adversity and triumphed. He is well loved at Brentford, where his teams have a reputation for playing good football.
One of the greatest challenges for supporters will be to pronounce his name correctly. Uwe is pronounced ‘oover’ . The ö of Rösler is pronounced like the ur in burn.
If Whelan does appoint Rosler it will be a bold move, as it was when he appointed Roberto Martinez.
His brief would be to get Latics into the playoffs this season. Maybe he could even get them promotion?
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