January 28, 2023 is a day that Hertha BSC supporters, rushing from crisis to crisis, will remember. After the 0: 2 in the derby against Union Berlin, the club fires Fredi Bobic and is once again in front of a shambles. The second division is getting closer and closer. Only a small time window remains.
For some Hertha fans, the derby day began with a police operation at Ostkreuz and ended for everyone who sticks with the permanent crisis club from Berlin’s Westend with the next decision that shook the club to its foundations. Fredi Bobic, who moved to the capital from Frankfurt a little over 18 months ago with great ambitions, has to pack his bags. The sporting director was fired just a few minutes after the 0:2 (0:1) against Union Berlin. The deepest valleys await the table seventeenth in the Bundesliga in the coming weeks and months. They still hope for salvation, but Hertha BSC is preparing to succeed the fallen traditional clubs Hamburger SV and FC Schalke 04.
A cold January day in Berlin, four derby bankruptcies in a row, the fall below the relegation line and the 0:5 debacle against VfL Wolfsburg are still in our minds. On the other hand, the ever-successful city rivals from the eastern part of the city with their confidence in their own strength, which is sometimes nothing more than the certainty of making fewer mistakes than their opponents. This can creep unpleasantly into the bones and cause upsets. But the way in which Hertha presented itself only hinted at the bad for the future.
In the next 48 hours, this should be shaped decisively by the new head of sport. The bloodless squad, which was never able to recover from the fatal transfer phase under Jürgen Klinsmann in January 2020, is lacking players everywhere who can still save this season. After Bobic’s exit and the signing of club legend “Zecke” Neuendorf and long-time academy director Benjamin Weber, there is hardly any time to react to the threatening crisis. Bobic had spent the last few weeks thinning out the squad.
Bobic just the end point of a used tag
That was his main task anyway since his arrival in the summer of 2021. The financial framework did not allow for anything else. Investor Lars Windhorst’s money wasted long ago and the pandemic with its ghost games did the rest. Bobic managed a collapsing entity that he could never prop up with his unfortunate emergency transfers of long-forgotten players like Fredrik Björkan or Dong-jun Lee. The manager celebrated at Frankfurt acted helplessly in the lowlands of the transfer market, the substance of the team was increasingly attacked. The transfer plus of over 40 million euros gnawed at the squad. Bobic’s trainer Tayfun Korkut and now Sandro Schwarz were unlucky. While other clubs were successful with similarly small means, Hertha only knew one way down!
Bobic, who was fired by the newly elected presidency under Kay Bernstein last summer, is moving on. As Bernstein had already hinted at in December. “Travellers shouldn’t be stopped,” he said to “kicker” and ended up having to wait in vain. Rudi Völler went to the DFB and Bobic remained under oaths of allegiance. He recently said that Hertha BSC had grown dear to his heart. The refreshing salary may have sweetened his decision. In the end, however, everything happened so quickly that even at the press conference after the game there was little sign of the drama unfolding just a few meters away. Trainer Schwarz explained how the league could still succeed and the obligatory press conference was announced for the following day. Then Bobic had to go. The closing point of a used tag.
as dr Felix Brych decided on goal
After a “third-place dispute” at Ostkreuz, at the other end of town, not all fans made it into the stadium. Around 300 Hertha supporters spent the afternoon with federal police, who were establishing the identities of those who had tried to attack fans of the city’s rivals at an S-Bahn stop. And because they belonged to the active scene and football is riddled with rituals that are difficult for outsiders to understand, those who had made it to the east stand held back. It remained strangely quiet there, where the hit from the “Berliner Luft” was listened to before the kick-off. Some even sang along: “Why do the real Berlin plants only thrive here, nope? Yes yesa, yes yesa, yes yes yes yes, that’s the Berlin air, air, air” and inevitably the question arose when that would happen was the last time a plant could thrive in this inhospitable place called the Olympic Stadium?
Perhaps things would have been very different if Dr. Felix Brych would have encountered a foul in the 67th minute when looking at the monitor in the VAR area. But he found nothing. Paul Seguin had scored after a textbook counterattack to make it 2-0 for Union, and yet the jubilation was limited, because on the other side Rani Khedira had played the ball and opponents in his own penalty area when he won the ball, only in which order was initially unclear. “I can’t see this VAR shit anymore. I can’t see it anymore, I can’t understand it anymore. That was a game-changing scene,” said Sport’s managing director, Fredi Bobic, after the game. Maybe it was even more. A crucial scene for the future, a tipping point for Hertha’s season and for Bobic himself. Penalties, maybe a yellow-red card for Khedira, who has already been warned. The 1:1. It could have been so nice, but it wasn’t. As is so often the case this season, which at Hertha consists of too many “should haves” and too few points.
The goal counted and so Hertha lost another game, the third in a row, the third of three this English week. 10:1 goals is the bitter truth from the last three games, the 0:2 in the derby was the most acceptable. Finally, the 17th in the league played against Bayern’s first pursuer – the second in the table. Hertha coach Schwarz had seen a “very good first half”, in which his team played “very bravely, very actively” and “pressed hard”. His opponent Urs Fischer had also seen a “hard-fought derby”, it was “very close over 90 minutes”. Hertha’s offensive man Marco Richter also wanted to emphasize the positive: “We had good approaches up front, but either the penultimate pass wasn’t right, there’s a leg in between or the goalkeeper is holding well. There’s always something at the moment, we have to work our way back into luck. “
Horrible first half as a highlight
However, it is also true that the level of the game was low, Union took little part in the active gameplay, but didn’t have to because Hertha were simply too harmless. As in almost every derby, the Köpenickers were lurking for mistakes or standards. Both would inevitably arise. And the offensive of the home team was once again just flotsam on the Spree. Although it was noticeable to Hertha that the players had the will, that they made an effort, as Schwarz, whose future is no longer quite so certain, later praised it. Nevertheless, Union only had to wait for a mistake – and so it was suddenly 0-1 in the 44th minute. Jean-Paul Boetius tried to clear a ball, but tackled his opponent on the sidelines, Christopher Trimmel skilfully took the free kick from the left into the box, Danilho Doekhi climbed the highest and headed in an untenable one.
The low blow after 45 minutes, in which Hertha celebrated the “many small victories”, i.e. won duels, demanded by Schwarz after the Wolfsburg bankruptcy, only to then run into a big defeat again at the decisive moment. The game, in which the sponsor “Medios Apotheke” was more concerned with welcoming players back onto the field after a break from injury, was already decided. No one believed Hertha could turn things around, least of all those who were down there on the pitch.
What will become of the Berlin air?
Another game that makes it clear how acute the threat of relegation for Hertha BSC is again. At the moment, not even the joker relegation would be in it, with which the club just pulled out of the affair last year. In 17th place, the Berliners can only be happy that FC Schalke 04 are doing a whole lot worse. It is so dramatic that the city rival is even asked if he would give support. Coach Urs Fischer promised to try to win as many games as possible for the benefit of his own success, but if that helps Hertha, that’s not bad. “This mood in this stadium, something would be missing. I’ll keep my fingers crossed for you,” he said, looking at Schwarz.
The atmosphere was strange at this Derby edition. While previous duels had been on the verge of breaking up several times, this time both parties stoically sang their songs – past each other. When the Unioners let their blocks burn ablaze at the beginning of the second half, it remained quiet and calm on the other side in the east curve. They were all still at Ostkreuz. After the game, the team trotted into the curve, but kept a good distance and – with the exception of goalkeeper and fan favorite Oliver Christensen – was quickly gone again. A few beer mugs flew, nobody had to take off their jersey, like they did after the last derby defeat.
But what happened in the curve, it could be said late in the evening, was the least of Hertha’s worries anyway, which after this first week after the return of the Bundesliga is hopelessly falling towards the second division. The strangest plants would have to thrive in the Olympic Stadium in spring, which is about to break out across the country, so that the “Berliner Luft” will be first class in the coming season as well.