I think I was originally spurred on to start putting a a few words onto the screen by Hertha’s 1:0 loss to HSV and a few tweets that I saw immediately after that game.
| Most of the tweets doing the rounds were the normal highs and lows of Hertha fans letting off steam but also a few talking about Hertha’s poor away form and Pal Dardai’s future. |  |
I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Pal is one of the best things that has happened to the club for many a long year in my humble opinion.
Hearing in the news about the sacking of managers like Roger Schmidt and even more so that of Claudio Ranieri really makes you wonder if there is such a thing as loyalty in football. Ranieri took Leicester, a struggling team, and against all of the odds kept them going to win the English Premier League. For his trouble, less than a year later, he was shown the door. How does that make any sense? As for the players who, as soon as Claudio left, started playing again and notching up points, could they not bust a gut to win for the man who led them to the title last season? It appears they were otherwise occupied. As for what was going on in the background? Who knows? Claudio is too decent a bloke to say but somebody was trying to push him out. Where is the loyalty in that?
I guess the powers that be at Leicester decided that the club was in a downward spiral and dropping out of the Premiere league with the corresponding drop in income was too high a price to pay for loyalty. Has big money really become so integrated into clubs that the prospect of demotion/lack of promotion/lack of European football outweighs any loyalty for successes achieved in the recent past?
Hearing in the news about the sacking of managers like Roger Schmidt and even more so that of Claudio Ranieri really makes you wonder if there is such a thing as loyalty in football. Ranieri took Leicester, a struggling team, and against all of the odds kept them going to win the English Premier League. For his trouble, less than a year later, he was shown the door. How does that make any sense? As for the players who, as soon as Claudio left, started playing again and notching up points, could they not bust a gut to win for the man who led them to the title last season? It appears they were otherwise occupied. As for what was going on in the background? Who knows? Claudio is too decent a bloke to say but somebody was trying to push him out. Where is the loyalty in that?
I guess the powers that be at Leicester decided that the club was in a downward spiral and dropping out of the Premiere league with the corresponding drop in income was too high a price to pay for loyalty. Has big money really become so integrated into clubs that the prospect of demotion/lack of promotion/lack of European football outweighs any loyalty for successes achieved in the recent past?
At Hertha, in recent years we had cases like Michael Skibbe where I feel he should have never been appointed in the first place and clearly couldn’t do the job. Otto Rehhagel was just a panic/emergency sticking plaster on a nightmare season from hell.
After the chaos that was the end of the 2011/12 season I won’t ever forget the 2012–13 season where, under Jos Luhukay, Hertha broke the record for the most points in a 2. Bundesliga season. To be fair when Jos lost his job at Hertha things had not been going so well at the club for quite a while and the club stuck with him for as long as they dared. I for one will always be grateful to Jos and the work that he did with Hertha after the summer of 2012.
After the chaos that was the end of the 2011/12 season I won’t ever forget the 2012–13 season where, under Jos Luhukay, Hertha broke the record for the most points in a 2. Bundesliga season. To be fair when Jos lost his job at Hertha things had not been going so well at the club for quite a while and the club stuck with him for as long as they dared. I for one will always be grateful to Jos and the work that he did with Hertha after the summer of 2012.
With the current managerial setup, whatever you may think of Michael Preetz he is Hertha’s top goal scorer and Pál Dárdai is our most capped player and blue and white blood runs through their veins.
Clearly there is a mental barrier with our lads playing away at the moment but that will pass. Perhaps a good game against Mainz will break the spell. The idiots on Twitter calling for Pál to be removed because of the poor run of away form show no loyalty and precious little IQ in my opinion. In 2012 we could hardly have dreamt of being in a position to be hoping for Europe and bringing talented players up through the academy.
My next train of thought relating to loyalty in football takes me to the subject of the relationship between: fans, clubs and the stadia where they play. There has been much talk about a new stadium for Hertha and I know people who argue on both sides this argument but I know where my heart lies on this one.
Only a fool would deny that the Olympiastadion is rarely full to capacity. In fact I believe I am correct in saying the attendance figures are approximately 64% on average. This inevitably has an impact on the atmosphere in the immediate area of empty blocks no matter how much is going on in the eastern end of the stadium. Secondly you have the running track which means there is always a distance between the fans and the game. To be fair, I think the impact of this reduces if you are in the upper tier where you are looking down on the field. Try as Hertha may, with various marketing strategies and offers Berlin will not reliably turn out in numbers greater than 40-45,000 on a regular basis.
Only a fool would deny that the Olympiastadion is rarely full to capacity. In fact I believe I am correct in saying the attendance figures are approximately 64% on average. This inevitably has an impact on the atmosphere in the immediate area of empty blocks no matter how much is going on in the eastern end of the stadium. Secondly you have the running track which means there is always a distance between the fans and the game. To be fair, I think the impact of this reduces if you are in the upper tier where you are looking down on the field. Try as Hertha may, with various marketing strategies and offers Berlin will not reliably turn out in numbers greater than 40-45,000 on a regular basis.
On the 30th March 2017, Hertha announced plans to build a brand new 55,000 seater purpose built stadium, to be ready in 2025. This coincides with the end of the current contract to play at the Olympiastadion. Hertha’s preferred option is to build the new stadium within the Olympic Park, next to the Olympiastadion and partially over the existing Schenckendorffplatz training ground. The idea being a smaller stadium can be filled, creating a better football experience with the fans closer to pitch.
This all sounds very dramatic and the “artists impressions” look very pretty but, in spite of this, with many of the diehard Hertha faithful (including myself) the Olympiastadion is part of the tradition of the club. The Old Lady has resided there since 1963 and, like it or not, the limestone columns and facades are part of the fabric and history of the club. Some people use the Nazi origins of the structure as an argument against its use. That despicable regime has no friends here but you can’t blame the stone for the hands that crafted it. If nothing else, it was built to impress and it certainly still does just that. The building itself adds a certain gravitas to the home game experience that few arenas can hold a candle to.
This all sounds very dramatic and the “artists impressions” look very pretty but, in spite of this, with many of the diehard Hertha faithful (including myself) the Olympiastadion is part of the tradition of the club. The Old Lady has resided there since 1963 and, like it or not, the limestone columns and facades are part of the fabric and history of the club. Some people use the Nazi origins of the structure as an argument against its use. That despicable regime has no friends here but you can’t blame the stone for the hands that crafted it. If nothing else, it was built to impress and it certainly still does just that. The building itself adds a certain gravitas to the home game experience that few arenas can hold a candle to.
There has already been political opposition to the new stadium and I believe I am correct in saying the SPD in Berlin / Charlottenburg have spoken up against the plan for the new stadium with the only occasional use of the Olympiastadion for major games. As a major contributor of funds to the city in the form of rent for the stadium the idea was never going to go down well with local politicians.
At the same time Hertha also announced a “Plan B” and this is where it gets really silly. If they are not allowed to build within the Olympic Park the second option is to build the new stadium outside Berlin completely in Ludwigsfelde to the south of the city in Brandenburg. For me this would mean a 45 minute journey rather than a 30 minute one but (and this is the crunch) the club is Hertha BERLIN and not Brandenburg.
Needless to say, wherever any new stadium is built, it will cost a significant amount of money. Hertha would not get these funds from the city as it would make no sense for the city to pay leaving them with an arguably world class stadium and no major tenant. As a result Hertha will have to come up with the money themselves somehow. You can’t raise that kind of money by holding “bring and buy sales” or selling Bratwurst so that leaves us with “investors”. The bottom line with “investors” is that they want to make money. They will apply whatever pressure they feel is necessary to Hertha in order to make that money. That may involve sacking managers, selling players, naming the new stadium the “Dildo King Stadium” and who knows what else. They will be a bunch of suits that in all likelihood will have no interest in football, the club or its fans.
Are the powers that be at Hertha taking us down the path of selling our soul to the devil?
If so, where is the loyalty in that?
Credit - Thanks to Opa for the stadium name suggestion :) - https://www.opas-reisetagebuch.de
At the same time Hertha also announced a “Plan B” and this is where it gets really silly. If they are not allowed to build within the Olympic Park the second option is to build the new stadium outside Berlin completely in Ludwigsfelde to the south of the city in Brandenburg. For me this would mean a 45 minute journey rather than a 30 minute one but (and this is the crunch) the club is Hertha BERLIN and not Brandenburg.
Needless to say, wherever any new stadium is built, it will cost a significant amount of money. Hertha would not get these funds from the city as it would make no sense for the city to pay leaving them with an arguably world class stadium and no major tenant. As a result Hertha will have to come up with the money themselves somehow. You can’t raise that kind of money by holding “bring and buy sales” or selling Bratwurst so that leaves us with “investors”. The bottom line with “investors” is that they want to make money. They will apply whatever pressure they feel is necessary to Hertha in order to make that money. That may involve sacking managers, selling players, naming the new stadium the “Dildo King Stadium” and who knows what else. They will be a bunch of suits that in all likelihood will have no interest in football, the club or its fans.
Are the powers that be at Hertha taking us down the path of selling our soul to the devil?
If so, where is the loyalty in that?
Credit - Thanks to Opa for the stadium name suggestion :) - https://www.opas-reisetagebuch.de
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