Perhaps the definition of “development” needs to be stated first. Development, as a common definition goes, refers to “the process of change Origin of a phenomenon across different stages of the change or even that decay to the present or a predetermined state.”
Admittedly, that sounds terribly complicated. But it’s actually quite simple if you apply it to football: The “current state” can be the most recently played game or the table position, the “previously determined state” can be the set goal for the season – and events occur during the season that affect this goal make more likely or less likely.
At Hamburger SV they have been talking about “development” for more than two years now, since the day Tim Walter was introduced as coach. A clever communication strategy in which everyone in the club actively participates, from the security staff at the Volksparkstadion to the sports director Jonas Boldt. After all, development is considered a laudable thing in football. Who could possibly object to that?
The Hamburg team endured the defeat in Osnabrück
It’s just stupid that this one word also appears in the definition of the term (see above): decay. A development, they never made this semantic distinction at HSV, can also have a negative course that torpedoes the season’s goal. The “path of development” that is always propagated in the club has not led to promotion in previous years. On Friday evening, HSV once again presented itself in a condition in which alarming signs of decline could be seen: Hamburg lost 2-1 to second division promoted Osnabrück.
The same result as last week in Elversberg, another newly promoted team, but with one key difference throughout the game: Hamburg simply let it slide this time. No rebellion in the final phase, no ideas, no at least belated acceptance of the fight. Apart from the interim opening goal by striker Robert Glatzel, the Walter team was unable to create a significant scoring opportunity – and this goal, it should be said, clearly fell into the category of “individual performance”. He was not the product of an intact football team.
“What happened in Osnabrück cannot be explained,” criticized HSV goalkeeper Daniel Heuer Fernandes, who looked as if he had just had the funeral of a beloved pet and not a second division game behind him: “We lose every aerial duel, every second ball , are too imprecise when in possession of the ball. The opponent was more present in all the content that defines us.” In doing so, Heuer Fernandes had named specific failings on the part of his team that, in his view, were decisive for the non-performance – a serious type of public relations work that his coach Tim Walter was once again not prepared to do. The people of Hamburg presented themselves as “absolutely bad,” said Walter, and the same applied to himself. There was no more depth of analysis. Instead, Walter insulted the TV reporters when they asked: “We were bad, what do you want to hear? There’s nothing more to say.”
Walter is a master of emotion – but that doesn’t guarantee victories against the little ones
The coach is often a bit tight-lipped after defeats, but his robust nature was well received by the HSV supporters for a long time. Walter always counters verbal attacks with counterattacks, his offensive football sometimes makes for spectacular games, and the Hamburg team got – despite two missed promotions – breathed new self-confidence. The thing is: Emotion wears out if football doesn’t provide new impulses. At the start of the season it certainly seemed as if Walter was making compromises on his footballing absolutes and making adjustments that increased stability.
But now there are more and more critics who have had enough of the traditional club failing because of the same things: an inadequate balance between offense and defense, the coach’s stoic approach, inexplicable (and inadequately explained by Walter) failures against the so-called little ones. In the previous season, HSV didn’t get any of twelve possible points against newly promoted teams, a fatal result for which Walter vowed to improve in Hamburg’s error analysis in the summer. The current yield: zero out of six points.
At HSV they know that roaring victories like those against league giants FC Schalke 04 (5:3) or Hertha BSC (3:0) have little value if the day’s work fails against the foundation of the second division. They also know that they have provided the coach with a squad that is sparkling by second division standards, which has enormous quality at the top and across the board and costs money accordingly. And no one knows better than sports director Boldt: HSV does not have the conditions of a “normal second division team”, although Walter recently claimed that.
A suitable development would therefore have to emerge slowly. Anything else would be an aberration – and from there it’s not far to signs of decline for a club that once again misses its goal for the season.