Commentary: Plzeň coach Hyský hanging by a thread after 5:5 draw with Teplice

FC Viktoria Plzeň are enduring a jittery start to the season, and the hot topic in the club's corridors right now is the possible future of head coach Miroslav Hyský. The trigger was a home 5:5 draw with Teplice, in which Plzeň were already 3:0 up after just ten minutes — only to let the lead slip away completely.

Under Hyský, Plzeň have yet to beat either of their main rivals, Slavia or Sparta. Add to that a run of dropped points last spring and a humiliating 0:3 cup exit at home to Karviná. This season's opening matches have come after a full preseason, though preparations were disrupted by the late return of several key players from the World Cup.

The same defensive collapses

Plzeň lost their opening match of the season 1:3 to Liberec, and by most accounts nothing about the team's performance worked that day. In the following fixture against Zbrojovka (1:1), the club conceded a soft goal and struggled to create chances at the other end.

The 5:5 draw with Teplice was the breaking point. "I can't even describe what's going on inside me right now. We're defending naively, and I just can't explain it," captain Matěj Vydra admitted after the match. Hyský himself noted afterwards that the team had finally started creating chances in attack — something that had been missing before — and asked fans and pundits to look for the positives in the performance.

Man-marking system keeps breaking down

Hyský has long relied on man-oriented marking, a tactic favored by many modern coaches. But Plzeň's opponents keep finding the antidote. Against Liberec, defender Sampson Dweh repeatedly failed to track the pacey forward Lukáš Mašek and only narrowly avoided conceding a goal or an assist to him.

Against Teplice, Matěj Radosta caused similar trouble, scoring once and setting up two more against a struggling Merhas Doskim. The pattern keeps repeating itself: whenever Plzeň commit numbers forward in attack, their defenders push up too high and fail to get back to their markers in time, regularly gifting opponents dangerous counterattacks.

According to sources close to the club, the question of Hyský's future on the Plzeň bench had already been discussed behind closed doors before the Teplice debacle. The club has reportedly signaled that the only way out of the crisis may be a change of head coach.

Around Prague, based on reporting by sport.cz