Bundesliga playoff: Advantage Hamburg

Hertha Berlin 0-1 Hamburg
(Reis 57')
Olympic Stadium, Berlin

It was a goal which summed up Hamburg, Hertha and this Bundesliga playoff first leg perfectly: sort of the right idea, terribly executed but it somehow just about worked and we'll do it all again on Monday night.

After almost an hour of football which was decidedly more second division than first, HSV's Ludovit Reis advanced down the left and his attempted cross looped over Oliver Christensen in the Hertha goal and into the back of the net.

"I was aiming for the back post," Reis admitted. "But ultimately it doesn't matter who scores or how it goes in."

It was unfortunate for Christensen, the young Dane making his first team debut for Hertha in place of the injured Marcel Lotka, but there will have been no sympathy for him among the 20,000 Hamburg fans gathered behind his goal.

They'd been singing about travelling to a big game in Berlin all season - albeit referring to the German Cup final, before HSV were knocked out by Freiburg in the semifinal.

But now, here they were anyway, 48 hours earlier than planned in a playoff they looked like missing out on again not long ago, and with one foot back in the Bundesliga four years on from their first ever relegation.

'HSV stands for something again'

"HSV stands for something again," head coach Tim Walter had said pre-match, elaborating: "Courage, readiness, youth and hunger." Whether "quality" of the sort required to compete in the Bundesliga can be added to that list remains to be seen.

With only 35 goals conceded, Hamburg recorded the best defense in the second division by far, and hardly allowed Hertha any major chances in the playoff first leg.

But there's work to be done in the final third, as a series of wayward crosses from Bakery Jatta in the first half showed.

Nevertheless, director of sport Jonas Boldt cut a confident figure at full-time. "A super performance from the team," he said. "Whether [Ludovit] meant it or not, I don't care. This team is coming together."

Just a few weeks ago, after a 1-0 defeat away at northern rivals Holstein Kiel, Hamburg were sixth and seemingly out of the 2. Bundesliga promotion race. But a run of five straight wins to finish the season, including a dramatic comeback away at Hansa Rostock on the final, propelled HSV into the playoff.

"After that experience in Kiel, everyone had written us off," said Boldt. "But we all sat down together and we were convinced that we are on the right path, and we carried on. This result tonight is the result of the last few weeks' work, and now we have one more home game to play." 

Tough task for Magath

However, not everyone connected to HSV was so pleased, with club legend Felix Magath now facing an uphill task as Hertha Berlin coach.

Magath made 385 appearances for HSV between 1977 and 1986, scoring 63 goals and winning three Bundesliga titles as well as the European Cup Winners' Cup (1977) and the European Cup (1983). His first job as a head coach was also in Hamburg in 1995. He later worked with current HSV coach Tim Walter with Bayern Munich's under-17s and under-23s, and is an acquaintance of Jonas Boldt.

He was aware of the specter of a potential playoff against his old club from the moment he took interim charge of Hertha, even saying as much in a couple of interviews, but he insisted ahead of kick-off that he's only focused on one thing:

"It's not about me or my history with HSV; it's all about Hertha and staying up. And we have the means to combat HSV."

But they were unable to break them down tonight and are edging closer and closer to relegation.