Tonda Eckert
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(head coach)
.jpg) Eckert with Southampton in 2025 | |||
| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Date of birth | 31 January 1993 | ||
| Place of birth | North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany | ||
| Height | 5 ft 10 in (1.78 m) | ||
| Team information | |||
Current team |
Southampton (head coach) | ||
| Senior career* | |||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
| Viktoria Arnoldsweiler E.V | |||
| Managerial career | |||
| 2025– | Southampton | ||
| * Club domestic league appearances and goals | |||
Tonda Eckert (born 31 January 1993) is a German professional football coach who is the head coach of EFL Championship club Southampton.
Early career
Eckert was always aiming for a career in sports, having studied at the Sporthochschule Köln (in Cologne). He has played football only at the amateur level, making several appearances for Viktoria Arnoldsweiler in the Mittelrheinliga (fifth tier) in the spring of 2016. By that time he had already worked for Germany's national team as an analyst at Euro 2012 and at the 2014 World Cup, also studying the culture of the adversary nation and what it might mean for the DNA of their team.[1]
As a coach, Eckert was assistant coach of the U17 team at 1. FC Köln from 2013 to 2016, before becoming assistant coach to Marco Rose of Red Bull Salzburg's U18 team in the 2016/17 season, when the team won the 2016/17 UEFA Youth League. Within the Red Bull group, he moved to RB Leipzig in 2017, where he spent two years as assistant coach of the U19 team, initially under Robert Klauß and then under Alexander Blessin. In the 2019/20 season, he was assistant coach to Miroslav Klose with FC Bayern Munich's U17 team.
Moving from his native Germany to England,[2] Eckert was appointed assistant manager to Gerhard Struber (whom he already knew from Salzburg) at Barnsley in August 2020[3] until January 2022.[4] In January 2022, he joined Genoa as assistant to Alexander Blessin, staying in Italy for three years and a half, using his time there to get his UEFA Pro Licence.
Southampton
In July 2025, Eckert was appointed Under-21s head coach at Southampton.[5][6] Following the dismissal of Will Still on 2 November 2025, Eckert was appointed interim head coach of the senior team. [7][8] His first match as head coach was a 2–1 victory away to Queens Park Rangers on 5 November.[9] This was followed by further victories: 3–1 at home to Sheffield Wednesday on 8 November[10] and 5–1 away to Charlton Athletic on 22 November.[11] On 5 December, Eckert was appointed as manager on a permanent basis.[12] On 13 March 2026, Eckert was awarded the EFL Championship Manager of the Month for February after Southampton picked up 13 points from a possible 15.[13] Continued good form in March saw him win the award for a second consecutive month, picking up 10 out of 12 possible points.[14]
