After just five months, sports director Boldt has to leave Hannover 96

Second division soccer team Hannover 96 has parted ways with sports director Jonas Boldt after just five months. The long-time board member of Hamburger SV is the second well-known football manager after Jörg Schmadtke to leave the club after only a short time this calendar year.

"The supervisory board of Hannover 96 Management GmbH, which is responsible for appointing the management, has unanimously agreed on Boldt's dismissal. The decision applies with immediate effect," says the short statement from Lower Saxony. Henning Bindzus is now the sole managing director of Hannover 96 GmbH & Co. KGaA.

At the end of October, after the derby defeat at Eintracht Braunschweig (0-2), “Bild” reported that the head of the supervisory board and long-time club boss Martin Kind turned away from Boldt early on. When he took office less than six months ago, he signed a contract until the end of May 2029.

After five years at HSV, the 44-year-old Boldt only started his job in Hanover in June with the clear goal of returning Hanover to the Bundesliga. The fact that the promotion candidate is only in 16th place in the table with eight points after nine match days and was eliminated from the DFB Cup in the second round is the responsibility of the sports director.

Early in the summer preparation, Boldt fell out with then-coach Christian Titz. Both represented very different positions when it came to squad planning, squad size and their desired transfers. After a disappointing start to the new season, Titz separated after the fifth matchday in September. Boldt's problem, however, is that things haven't gone better since then under his successor, Sandro Wagner.

The former sports director of Bayer Leverkusen is also criticized for his transfer policy. In the summer, Hannover lost three ambitious players to first division clubs: Noel Aseko (Eintracht Frankfurt), Enzo Leopold (Borussia Mönchengladbach) and Daisuke Yokota (Glasgow Rangers). Marcel Hartel (30) and Berat Sahiti (27) came as replacements, but so far they have neither been convincing in terms of sport nor have much resale value. The dispute between Boldt and Titz blocked numerous transfer ideas in the summer.

Afterwards, Hannover 96 still has to contend with the consequences of a personnel change: the departure of former sports director Marcus Mann, who moved to Red Bull Salzburg in December 2025. His successor Schmadtke left after just three months due to differences with the shareholders. Boldt didn't last much longer.