“That,” said Benjamin Weber, “was a real slap in the face.” Hertha’s sporting director has been in situ for less than three months, but he is already acclimatised to the chaos of the capital club. Not surprisingly, perhaps. Before returning to the club in late January he had served them for almost two decades in a variety of roles. “I’m a Berliner. I’m a Herthaner,” he told his introductory press conference.
This, then, will hurt. Hertha have been circling the drain for a while now, retaining their top-flight place via the relegation playoff last season having finished two points clear of the playoff spot the campaign before. This season has been more of the same struggle and instability. However this, as Weber’s assessment suggested, was something so much worse than the troubles to which they have become accustomed in recent times.
Friday’s trip to Schalke represented an opportunity to breathe some life back into a flagging season and to begin to cut away one of the weakest (if not the weakest) team in the division. Instead, Hertha ended up looking like a team “unfit for the Bundesliga,” as WAZ’s Philipp Ziser put it, conceding five goals to the lowest scorers in the division and slumping to rock bottom.
It had felt as if coach Sandro Schwarz was safe before this, despite the team’s difficulties, with it broadly understood that the travails on the pitch are largely a product of the circus of recent seasons off it. They have seen unsuccessful investment, power struggles, relatively modest Union becoming indisputably Berlin’s best team, the bizarre Jürgen Klinsmann era and more. Yet the nature of this humbling felt like not just a setback but a fatal blow that was unjustifiable, unacceptable and inexcusable.
Asked about his future after the game, Schwarz didn’t attempt to hide. “It is legitimate and realistic for the club and its sporting director to be concerned,” he admitted. Pundit Jonas Hummels spelt it out on DAZN. “Honestly, after a performance like this,” he said, “this coach cannot survive the day.”
It took until Sunday for confirmation that Schwarz had gone, to be replaced by that most faithful of club men, Pal Dardai – with two previous spells as Hertha head coach behind him, following on from 297 league appearances for the club (across the top two divisions, naturally). This is the final throw of the dice. Schwarz’s shortcomings were underlined here by the actions of his opposite number Thomas Reis, who made five changes to the XI that lost so comprehensively and demoralisingly at Hoffenheim the week before, and reaped the rewards.
Hertha, on the other hand, were inert. Tim Skarke, on loan from Union, was allowed to dribble into position to curl in a spectacular strike for Schalke’s opener inside two-and-a-half minutes, his first top-flight goal at the age of 26, and Hertha rarely had anything resembling a foothold in this most important of matches from that point. They were 2-0 down in the 13th minute when a lonely-looking Marius Bülter nodded in Skarke’s cross at the back post – Kicker’s Steffen Rohr observed Bülter “could have had a cup of coffee” before nodding in, such was the space and time afforded to him. A brilliant goal back for Stevan Jovetic in first-half added time should have reignited Hertha’s hopes. Instead, it just underlined how they were largely being given a footballing lesson by a club that would walk over hot coals to have attacking quality like Jovetic and Belgium’s Dodi Lukebakio, who had crossed towards the Montenegrin at the far post.
The lesson continued. Simon Terodde and Bülter added goals after more statuesque defending before a largely irrelevant one back from Marco Richter for the visitors. Marcin Kaminski’s excellent late free-kick added salt to the wound, and underlined another of Hertha’s myriad problems. They have the second-worst defensive record from set pieces – and the worst attack from them, yet to score from 120 attacking dead-ball situations so far this season. There were signs of unrest everywhere, with recently returned midfielder Tolga Cigerci unhappy at his substitution after 26 minutes, but so listless was this performance – Inga Böddeling of Berliner Morgenpost describing their defenders as having “looked like uninvolved extras” was spot on – nobody could have complained about being taken off.
Weber pledged after Friday’s game that “we will leave no stone unturned” as Hertha try to stop the slide. Dardai may or may not have the answer – and the club will hope for a response like the last time he took over mid-season, in 2021, when an eight-match unbeaten run saw them to safety – but at least some pride should be evident from now on.
Talking points
• Borussia Dortmund lost no ground in the title race this weekend but it felt as if they had lost momentum and so much more in an extraordinary end to Saturday afternoon’s visit to Stuttgart. Cruising into a 2-0 half-time lead against the strugglers, who also had Konstantinos Mavropanos sent off before the break, BVB inexplicably let their lead slip late on, letting in two in seven minutes to the 10 men. It seemed like they had redeemed themselves when substitute Giovanni Reyna lashed them back in front in stoppage time, but then debutant defender Soumaïla Coulibaly took a fresh air shot trying to clear Josha Vagnoman’s cross and Silas fired an equaliser to make it 3-3 with the last kick of the game. The final whistle had already gone in Munich, with Bayern drawing 1-1 with Hoffenheim, and Dortmund were level on points with the champions before Silas struck. “It’s hard to find the words,” a shocked Edin Terzic told Sky. “We thought we already experienced the worst thing this season, losing at home to Werder Bremen when we were 2-0 up in the 88th minute. This tops it.”
Bayern Munich 1-1 Hoffenheim, Cologne 1-1 Mainz, Eintracht Frankfurt 1-1 Borussia Mönchengladbach, RB Leipzig 3-2 Augsburg, Schalke 5-2 Hertha Berlin, Stuttgart 3-3 Borussia Dortmund, Union Berlin 1-1 Bochum, Werder Bremen 1-2 Freiburg, Wolfsburg 0-0 Bayer Leverkusen
• The mood was almost as sombre in Munich, as Bayern also let a lead slip to a team battling against the drop. Benjamin Pavard had given Bayern a first-half lead – again, the champions’ defenders doing the job their forwards should be – before Andrej Kramaric’s free-kick beat Yann Sommer, who might have done better with it. Thomas Tuchel, so positive about his side’s performance in defeat at Manchester City, was visibly deflated with this lethargic display. “We missed a huge opportunity to get ourselves and the fans to believe,” he lamented ahead of Wednesday’s second leg, for which he confirmed Sadio Mané will return from a club suspension.
• After Borussia Mönchengladbach’s 1-1 draw at Eintracht Frankfurt (the inevitable Randal Kolo Muani saved the out-of-form home side a point seven minutes from time) in Saturday’s late game, their sporting director Roland Virkus defended Sommer after recent criticism of the now-Bayern goalkeeper. “You can certainly have a game that isn’t so good,” argued Virkus, “but that doesn’t detract from [his] achievements. Yann is an excellent goalkeeper and I don’t think it’s OK that everything is dumped on him.”
• The Champions League race is as tight as ever, with Union retaining third despite a draw with struggling Bochum (with Urs Fischer complaining of “15 minutes where we were begging for a [Bochum] equaliser”), Leipzig in fourth by beating Augsburg 3-2 and a Lucas Höler winner for Freiburg at Werder Bremen keeping them only a point behind.
| Pos | Team | P | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bayern Munich | 28 | 48 | 59 |
| 2 | Borussia Dortmund | 28 | 23 | 57 |
| 3 | Union Berlin | 28 | 12 | 52 |
| 4 | RB Leipzig | 28 | 18 | 51 |
| 5 | Freiburg | 28 | 4 | 50 |
| 6 | Bayer Leverkusen | 28 | 10 | 44 |
| 7 | Eintracht Frankfurt | 28 | 8 | 42 |
| 8 | Mainz | 28 | 7 | 42 |
| 9 | Wolfsburg | 28 | 10 | 40 |
| 10 | Borussia M'gladbach | 28 | -2 | 36 |
| 11 | Cologne | 28 | -9 | 32 |
| 12 | Werder Bremen | 28 | -11 | 32 |
| 13 | Hoffenheim | 28 | -9 | 29 |
| 14 | Augsburg | 28 | -16 | 29 |
| 15 | VfL Bochum | 28 | -30 | 27 |
| 16 | Stuttgart | 28 | -15 | 24 |
| 17 | Schalke 04 | 28 | -26 | 24 |
| 18 | Hertha Berlin | 28 | -22 | 22 |
