The Berlin Chronicles: Chaos reigns in the Bundesliga
Cheers, Michael Preetz. Really, thanks a fucking lot mate. I’ve spent a week writing an overlong, rambling piece about German goalkeepers which I’ve still not finished, and I get out of bed this morning to find out that I might as well just fucking bin it. Hertha have sacked last years God and this years Judas, Lucian „Lulu“ Favre and his fellow Swiss assistant coach Harry Gämperle. Maybe it won`t set the world on fire this news, but as one of the Berlin correspondents for this fine organ I am just gonna have to tell you all about the story of Lulu and his (former) Luvvers. Yep Falko Görtz’s successor, Hertha Berlins sixteenth manager in twenty one years has been given the old heave-ho.
So lets start this crap off by shoehorning in a cliche or two. Some potential headlines maybe? „Boom-bang-a-Bang, Lulu’s been fired“. Or how does „Lulu, Try to understand“ grab you? No, not getting the old Lulu jokes eh? Oh well, they were the best I could muster at short notice. Actually, I’m none too amored with Strathclyde’s own swinging sixties singing siren, but she did have a number one in the states with „To sir with Love“, so am just presuming that someone somewhere will get it. They don’t here in Germany. I’ve just tried out a hoary little line about Lulu winning the Eurovision song contest at 20, whereas the boss of the same name couldn’t even beat the Latvian Champions (with their 2 best players suspended to boot) in the Europa League last week. I thought it was pretty funny anyway. Nevermind.
So where was I? Oh yeah. Goalkeepers, no, Lulu. Erm, maybe we should start this again?
Hertha sack Lucien Favre. The man who guided them to 4th last year, when they were within two weeks of possibly, actually, winning the championship for the first time since 1931. But why? Or, more pertinently, why were they so good last year and so shit in this one? Personally, I blame Michael Preetz, but no one seems to be calling for his head yet. While the Berlin press were getting themselves worked up about wheteher or not Andrej Voronin and (the beloved) Marco Pantelic were going to stay or not (they weren’t) there was a massive barney going on backstage as the president, Werner Gegenbauer, forced out General manager Dieter Hoeneß a year before his contract was due to end for (cue big surprises here) generally getting too big for his boots. It got a bit nasty, but the preordained successor was already there in Michael Preetz, the former Hertha (and sometime Germany) striker waiting for his big call up. With no money to spend, Preetz’s contact book was going to have to come into full effect at the start of the season, but it was obviously not quite as fat as Dieter’s- though you’d think it should have been, as a former vice president of the fucking players union. The players he brought in were too few, too late and not good enough. Frankly the return of a much maligned, and utterly pony, former striker (Wichniarek) promised little, and then to join him with an unheard of Columbian partner (Ramos) alongside Raffael, the least lethal finisher in Germany since Von Stauffenberg, hardly bolstered an attack that only scored 48 goals last season.
Brett Favre was not sacked as Hertha's manager,
They’ve been unlucky too though. Gojko Kacar started the first couple of games marauding through midfield and scoring a couple too before getting, inevitably, injured. Jaroslav Drobny, a superb, top level Goalkeeper, doing the same and leaving the door open, in a failing team for a 19 year old to make his Bundesliga debut- and heres the guy that I really feel sorry for in this shambles- Carsten Burchert. His Hertha career could hardly start off worse than coming in to a side who are, frankly awful in front of goal, flabby in the middle and flailing around at the back like a chicken thats been stuck to a barn door with No More Nails (you’ll just have to trust me on that one, thats a whole lot of flailing going on). Arne Friedrich and Favre’s relationship had been rocky since the end of last season when he got dropped from the side, and the defenders form has been so shabby that he has lost his national team place as well. So, Burchert comes in for their titan of a keeper for his debut. He wasn’t really at fault for any of the four goals that went in that day against Freiburg at home, but it had to hurt. Follow that up with a cup tie against 2nd division 1860 Munich that they lost on penalties (and getting nowhere near any of them) after clawing their way back from 2-0 down at half time. This guy. This poor fucker, then has the indignity of being sent back to the reserves as a replacement is bought, from Red Bull Salzburg, by the name of Timo Ochs, who then procedes to concede five on his debut against Hoffenheim. It wasn’t made any easier for Burchert when in the cup tie his opposite number was a former Hertha legend, the man in the pyjama bottoms himself, former Crystal Pace keeper Gabor Kiraly showed him actually how to save penalties. The fans gave Kiraly a better reception than Burchert. Well, Burchert has got to walk the line again on Thursday in his European debut away at Sporting Lisbon and, presumably, will be hoping that the mugs in front of him can react a little better to the temporary coach, Karsten Heine, than they have been recently. Only three points from a possible twentyone so far this season tells you everything you need to know. So, bottom of the table, with a trip to Portugal followed by the next home game on Sunday against Bruno Labbadia’s top of the table Hamburg, who beat Bayern rather conclusively last weekend, to go without a coach. Easy, yeah, as Big Daddy would say.
Gabor Kiraly may have gotten a nice reaction from the fans, but it wasn't anything near what The Hoff would get in Germany
So whats next for Hertha. They need to get out of this mess pretty sharp-ish, but the situation is certainly not yet terminal. A point against Hamburg would be a massive result, and then they go to Nürnberg, and Köln in the next four games (admittedly away at Wolfsburg inbetween seems to be a write off) who are the only 2 teams to have scored less than Hertha. Away at Dortmund is always tricky, but they are massively underperforming at the Westfallenstadion and coach Jurgen Klopp is hitting hard times himself. It’s still pretty tight at the bottom of the table, with only 5 points between Hertha and Stuttgart in 11th, so a new boss bounce could have the Old Lady back in mid table mediocrity by Christmas. They’ll feel a whole lot more comfortable there.
Just as long as the new boss isn’t, and I repeat, isn’t Lothar Mattheus. Lothar Matthheus, Ho-ho-ho-thar Mattheus who could antagonise an empty room within one second of opening his gob is actually being suggested in some quarters. It won’t happpen though, it’d be too interesting. The smart money seems to be on a return for former coach Hans Meyer, but he’s well into his sixties now. That leaves a golden trio of Dieter Hecking, Klaus Augenthaler and the wonderfully named Friedhelm Funkel to get the big seat. The papers seem to think that the new guy will be in place by Friday, so we’ll see, but he’s going to have to work pretty fast to get this old lady out of bed.
lordelevation
globalcorrespondent
