Hertha are now promoted that much we know.  The most important challenge for this season has been achieved with four matches to spare.  Now the new mission, winning the championship!  Four points clear of Braunschweig and twelve points to play for.

Braunschweig kick of the action this Friday but I can't watch it so I'll be relient on my mobile apps to keep me inforned of progress.  The last two encounters for these two teams resulted in 3:0 and 3:1 wins for Braunschweig so they will fancy their chances. If they were to draw or loose it would be great for Hertha, but it wasn't to be. Braunschweig won 1:0 with a goal from Vrancic deep into injury time.

Congratulations to Eintracht Braunschweig on their promotion to the Bundesliga to join Hertha in the 2013/14 season. It's been a long time coming for them..

St Pauli
This was another humdinger! Before I start on about the match I thought I'd mention I noticed the intact WW2 Flak Tower next to the St Pauli ground. Massive structures in reinforced concrete and notable for me because two of the three were blown up and/or buried in Berlin. Only the one overlooking the Gesundbrunnen shopping centre is even partially intact and accessible. Half if that one was blown up and the debris buried under a man made "hill". The one in Hamburg stands there - bold as brass. I might go and check that out one day.

The match
Hertha came out strong and were dominating possession as you might expect in the first few minutes of the match. Thus culminated in a goal in by Sammi Allagui with an assist from Ronny. The match didn't stay like this however and St Pauli started looking increasingly dangerous on the break. Thomas Kraft had a very uncharacteristicly strange match. In the 32nd minute he picked up a yellow after running about 30m out and taking out Ginczek I think it was. He did a bit if this running forward in this match.  Hertha went in a goal up at half time but St Pauli's Lennart Thy scored a deserved equaliser in the 66th minute.

Things got a little sticky for Hertha for a spell following the goal and the woodwork took a bit of a pounding as a result. Things went rapidly downhill when Kraft leaping up to punch the ball away in the box was deemed to be a foul and the referee pointed to the spot. Ginczek put it way in the 85th minute and St Pauli and their fans must have thought they had it in the bag. But life is sometimes cruel and it was to be Hertha's day. A beautiful strike from who else but Ronny equalised in the 88th minute and in the 90th the substitute Sandro Wagner scored the winner. Total dismay for St Pauli but delight for Hertha!

Four points ahead of Braunschweig with three games and nine points to play for . . . there us still so much to play for!

What a day to go to a football match! It was another lovely spring day with sun
and a good crowd at the Olympiastadion. 52,135 fans were in the stadium to
support the boys in their quest for promotion into the Bundesliga next season.

The ref. added two minutes of extra time but it ended with a 1:0 home victory for Hertha!
We stayed in the stadium for about an hour after it ended and saw the players being showered with beer in front if the Ostkurve. As Ronny ran away from a big jug of of beer down the running track - I thought I was back at the 2012 Olympics for a minute!

Here is a video clip of the fans saluting the team after the match . . and the team sauting the fans!

Just a couple of photos . . . . .

The weather so far has been superb in Berlin thus weekend. On Saturday the sun was shining and and it was over 20°C in the sun as my wife and I rode our bikes around town taking in some of the sites. For a large chuck of the afternoon I was in my shirt sleeves although when we got back the wife of the Landlord from our local Kneipe/pub thought I was mad! To be fair, she is probably right . .

We spent the day cycling around the North West of the city starting just before 09:00 and finishing at about 17:30. We saw loads of cool stuff in the lovely spring sunshine and here is the route we took: up to the Zoologischer Garten, through the Tiergarten to the Brandenburg gate for the inevitable photos, up the Siegessäule for the amazing views, an Eiskaffee in the Teehaus im Englischen Garten, past the old AEG turbine hall, a quick visit to the Plötzensee Memorial, past Tegal Airport, along the Berlin- Soandau Ship Canal, back through Siemenstadt and Charlottenburg to Wikmersdorf. When we got back I tucked into a well deserved bowl of asparagus soup followed by a big plate of one of my favourites - Blutwurst und Leberwurst - yum!

Whist I was getting saddle sore Kaiserlautern won 3:0 at home against Paderborn but, today is Sunday and it's match day for Hertha who face Sandhausen. A win gains us promotion to the Bundesliga and keeps us on target for being champions. The city is starting to buzz - lines of people buying tickets in the fan shop in Hauptbahnhof, people buying the bargain Hertha flags for €2,50. I am hoping the blue skies are an omen of good fortune and we have a chance to wave our flags with pride!

Just look at this amazing bargain - two tickets for ten Euros!! For five Euros - £4:30 / $6.50 . . you could easily spend that on a burger at a London ground . .

Hey, lets make one thing clear before I start - I am really NOT a Bayern München fan in ANY way.
Having said this I saw part of the Bayern DFB Pokal semi against Wolfsburg last night. I saw Mario Gomez come on in the 77th minute and by the 87th he had a hattrick. He is just such a goal scoring machine.
Why, oh why, does he spend so much time on the bench when half of the teams in Europe would give their first born to have him in their starting eleven?
I do not care about Bayern as a club, but as an individual? A footballers working life is so short and to not play half the time . . so little game time? It just appears such a total waste of a huge footballing talent.
Gripe over . . .

Hertha have 63 points .

Kaiserslautern and Köln have 49

The Hertha goal difference is 16 or 24 higher than these two teams.

If Hertha win against Sandhausen they will be either: 14, 16 or 17 points above the playoffs with four games and 12 points to play for!

Another win against the 17th place Sandhausen will guarantee promotion to the Bundesliga for the 2013/14 season.

Take nothing for granted . . . but back in November, Hertha beat Sandhausen away 1:6 . . . . even I am optimistic!

On Friday, just four days after their victory against Braunschweig, Hertha travel to the Audi Sportpark to face Ingolstadt. The last two encounters with Ingolstadt resulted in draws. Back in November there was a goalless draw in the Olympiastadion. Prior to that, there was an away game in Ingolstadt that ended 1:1 in March 2011.

If Hertha do win, they will all but guarantee promotion as they will only need one from the remaining fifteen points. All this is assuming Kaiserslautern win their match on Monday but if Kaiserslautern were to not win . . .

I cannot help hoping that circumstances contrive to allow Hertha to clinch promotion when playing at home at the Olympiastadion. It would be great for the fans and the atomisphere would be awesome. I'll be at the Sandhausen match next week so that would be a good time!!

Hertha had 60% of the possession but the two teams combined only had three shots on target - two of which went in. You could argue that says it all!

Braunschweig won 3:1 against Sandhausen so the gap at the top narrows to just two points. The battle for being the top continues with less than a game between the top two.  Köln managed a very late goal to win their game on Sunday 1:0 against Aalen  leapfroging Kaiserslautern in the process.  This narrows the gap below Hertha to the playoff spot to 14 points - until Monday night anyway.

We'll have to see on Monday how Kaiserlautern do to really judge what impact dropping those two points will have and see what might happen next week when Sanhausen come calling . . .

Match day 28 brings the biggest single match left for Hertha, one that may be key in seeing who ends up the 2. Bundesliga champions in 2012/13. On Monday the old lady meet Eintracht Braunschweig at the Olympiastadion. Again I am not able to get to this Monday night match although should be able to catch it on the small screen.

Hertha are just one point above Braunschweig at the moment although their goal difference is better by eight goals. The away match ended at 1:1 in October with goals from Kruppke and Ramos so Hertha go into the game all square. After this match there will be only 18 points left to play for in the season and the top two are locked in a dual 12/13 points above the playoff spot.
I know I am totally biased but I desperately want Hertha to win this one and start to pull away at the top and get that much closer to that all important promotion. This is a Hertha blog so I am allowed to be biased!

There was a massive match for the playoff spot at 18:00 on Friday evening between Köln and Kaiserslautern. A draw would have been good from my habitual biased viewpoint. Keep as much distance between Hertha and the playoffs as possible. It could have gone either way but the Red Devils have not been playing so well of late. Having said this, Kaiserslautern scored two goals, one on either side of half time to go 2:0 up by the 50th minute. They scored again in the 79th to make it a clear cut 3:0 win in the end. So, Hertha will be 11 points off the playoffs tonight with tonights game in hand and six games left in the season. If we can only win tonight . . .

Fantastic news was announced at the stadium tonight saying Ronny has signed a contract to stay in Berlin until at least 2017 ! !

Hertha pulled off a truly massive win at the Olympiastadion in front of just over 51,000 fand includinf 10,00 Braunschweig fans and they put on a very convincing display indeed. Braunschweig really had no answers for Hertha who were a much stronger side across the board.  Time and time again Braunschweig resorted to fouling to close down Hertha advances.  They picked up two yellows within fourteen minutes at the start of the first half! 

In an unfortunate but nasty clash of heads saw Peter Niemeyer taken off on a stretcher with bad concussion.  He was conscious when he was carried away from the touchline but he went straight to hospital.  Fingers crossed Peter will recover quickly.  

A free kick from Ronny in the 34th minutes went low and took a deflection (I think) into the net to give Hertha the lead.  It was a fantastic strike, wonderfully received by the crowd especially in the light of Ronny’s new contract.  A great way to celebrate the new contract!

The second half started with Hertha in command of the game.  Ten minutes in a little piece of magic was produced by Adriam Ramos. Running down the right wing he was just too fast for Deniz Dogan and the Braunschweig defence to keep up with him and he produced a wonderful chip over the keeper to put Hertha 2:0 ahead.

Just to wrap it all up, after yet another foul, Hertha had a free kick on the edge of the box and guess who stepped up to take it?  You guessed it Ronny!  What a free kick, blasted into the net putting Hertha 3:0 up and giving them the vital three points.

Bearing in mind Hertha were playing Eintract Braunschweig are second in the table and wel clear of the playoff spot themselves, Hertha really bossed the second half.  The shot ratio of 7:1 to Hertha really says it all I think. 

This leaves Hertha four points clear at the top of the table and fourteen points above the playoff spot with six games and eighteen points to play.  Just four more points and promotion is in the bag.  If all goes well, the promotion could be won in the next home match against Sandhausen.  I really hope so as I’ll be there to see it!

Nothing is guaranteed naturally, Hertha still have to at least draw against FC Ingolstadt next week.  But for now . . . Spitzenreiter Spitzenreiter HEY HEY!!

Just a small moan here . . .

Earlier this afternoon I listened to part of the radio commentary of the Chelsea v Sunderland match on Radio 5 Live. Chelsea went on to win 2:1 against Sunderlandand their new manager.

My grouch is with what one of the commentators said about "continental" managers (meaning RB) tending to shut up shop once they get a lead and not pushing for extra goals.

What total utter rubbish - I couldn't believe my ears! I'm no fan of Rafa but to lump all non-English managers into one bundle and say they park the bus when they get a goal ahead is absurd in the extreme. To imply that only English managers go for the throat is just bonkers at best.

How did he think Bayern scored nine against Hamburg last week? By accident??

Totally irrational perhaps but it just rattled my cage - moan over . . . .