Hertha BSC is relegated from the Bundesliga: It was Berlin – Sport

Popular music culture is filled with songs about unrequited affection, toxic relationships, or how difficult it can be to love a woman. There are many people in Berlin who would like to put it more precisely: Nothing is more difficult than loving an “old lady”. And yet they do. And how they do it. On Saturday, for example, they accepted an invitation to a Bundesliga game against Bochum, which had a delicately applied mourning border.

More than 70,000 people, most of them: Hertha sympathizers. they hoped. And they had reason for hope. Until the last minute of stoppage time, when everything suddenly died: Bochum’s Keven Schlotterbeck rose to the header, heaved the ball into the net from five meters and let Hertha, who had been leaking for years, go down. Because the goal to make it 1-1 was synonymous with Hertha’s seventh relegation in Bundesliga history.

“Hertha didn’t get relegated today,” said coach Pal Dardai after the game – and he not only said it with great certainty, but also with justification. Since HSV, no club in the Bundesliga has flirted with relegation as persistently as Hertha BSC; when it was completed on Saturday evening, just before half past five, the foot soldiers, who had shown themselves to be so loyal in the most difficult times, were so worn down and exhausted from years of misery that there was hardly any strength left for anger. Just emptiness.

“I can’t realize it yet,” says the howling Ur-Herthan Boateng

One by one they fell to the ground; Goalkeeper Oliver Christensen, who made two brilliant saves and then didn’t have a chance to concede, pulled the green jersey over his head – presumably to hide his tears. Kevin-Prince Boateng, who ran onto the field as captain and can be considered a Ur-Herthaner, spoke into one or two microphones from TV stations, then he ran through the stadium catacombs without saying another word. He howled like a castle dog. It was his last game as a professional at the Berlin Olympic Stadium. “I can’t realize it yet,” he had previously said on Sky.

Which, given the unlikely climax of the game, was only understandable. Half an hour before the final whistle he let himself be celebrated like a tribune when he was substituted. Because Hertha had just led 1-0 and cut a path to survival. And in an improbable way too. Lucas Tousart (64th) had headed in from a corner, something Hertha hadn’t managed to do in the whole season so far. One might even have thought that Hertha felt in their element on the razor’s edge.

Because she had, just for example, accepted the denial of the possible opening goal by the video referee (VAR). In front of Dodi Lukebakio’s goal, the VAR saw a foul by the aged and brilliant Stevan Jovetic in midfield. All of that was shortly before the end of the game: Waste. Hertha slept through a moment of transition and defended the following corner kick dramatically badly. That’s when short-term memory turned into a baseball bat that landed in the pit of my stomach.

The key question for the future is: does the contract with the new investor comply with the “50+1” statutes?

Because that was also part of the truth of the day: that Hertha could have scored the second or third goal. Substitute Chidera Ejuke hit the post once. Instead, it was 1-1, which from Bochum’s point of view means that at least FC Schalke will be behind them in the table when the last matchday kicks off in a week’s time. For Hertha, the goal was the last rites, at least as far as being in the first division.

Only: It could all get worse. Hertha is currently fighting for the license to be confirmed by the German Football League (DFL). So far, she has only received this temporarily. Managing director Tom E. Herrich openly admitted for the first time at the general meeting last week that there was a risk of not being granted the license. There are also differences with the DFL on the question of whether Hertha’s contract with the US investor 777 Partners corresponds to the “50+1” rules or not – i.e. the statute intended to limit the influence of investors. Hertha says that’s the case, the DFL sees it “a little differently,” explained Herrich.

The squad is facing a major upheaval – if only because of the lower income in the second division. Hertha has to generate transfer income: i.e. sell players who Hertha executives, above all “Zecke” Neuendorf, have denied in the past few days their suitability for the first division. That didn’t sound pricey. Hertha tries to score points in the appendix by promising a “Berlin way”, which means: Above all, players from the academy should be washed up.

What a radical change of course after high-flying dreams of attacking the European establishment when Lars Windhorst joined in mid-2019 and then pumped a total of €374m into the club. For a few months, Hertha was on the Champs-Élysées of the European transfer market, taking French Tousart from Lyon for an alleged 25 million euros, for example. well

The future of coach Dardai is still open

Whether Dardai will continue as a coach remained open on Saturday. He will first prepare a written and clear analysis and present it to the club’s management, he said. “We’re not ready to talk about my future yet,” Dardai said. He will not apply. That’s not necessary either: His audience success at the general meeting, where he was greeted with a standing ovation, spoke volumes. In him you see the man who, after Sandro Schwarz, spoke Tacheles, formed a heart out of entrails, which they believed in in the east curve – and in which they also believed on Saturday.

Because that’s what the Berliners did against Bochum: fight, scratch, bite. And they didn’t really care that sweeping the game with a broom could only save a few minutes of football. Because Bochum were even more nervous than Hertha. It seemed as if there were eleven Herthaners on the pitch, fighting against the stigma Neuendorf had given them, bringing out their pride, fighting relegation.

But then there was this one corner that Hertha couldn’t avoid because only Schlotterbeck jumped to the ball in the six-yard box and no Berliner. And because that one goal was scored that gave Hertha, who had been walking on the abyss for years, one last, inevitable push into the second division. And yet: What Hertha remains, on all the rubble, is the love of so many.

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