Archiv

Dortmund vs. the city of crisis

21.09.2012, 22:45 Uhr von: Redaktion

A long, long time ago, a match against Hamburg was one at eye level, with the HSV having high class players
in its ranks. The club still proudly accentuates that it is the only one remaining in the Bundesliga since day one, never having to go to the second division. Last season, it turned out to be a lot of hard work to maintain this record as Hamburg was close, very close to the second division. At the moment, even the Hamburg supporters themselves can't believe what has happened to their club.
Having a look towards Hamburg these days, there is only one word that comes to mind: crisis. In fact, it is a double crisis: Football as a sport itself is not the beautiful game to look at anymore. The HSV has lost every single game since the beginning of the season, including the cup game, although it miraculously pulled out a lot of money to get back formerly everybody's darling Rafael van der Vaart. (Acutally, the money didn't appear all that surprisingly, but was offered by the millionaire Klaus-Michael Kühne, who already invested 12.5 million a couple of years ago.) So let's see if van der Vaart can really rescue a whole club on his own when there is only one single other German team, Hoffenheim, that does worse than the HSV.

The second aspect of the double crisis in Hamburg is even worse because it directly affects our beloved game. The club officials in Hamburg set the ticket prices for the game against the Borussia far too high, squashing all hopes that were risen by the negotiations that evolved around last season's demonstrations. They seem to wish to establish a tradition of demonstrations of "Kein Zwanni" in their city - already last season, hundreds of Dortmund supporters decided not to attend the game and rather stay in front of the Volksparkstadion in Hamburg and listen to the game via radio. Officials obviously believe that the football in Hamburg is so highly attractive that they don't need BVB supporters in their stadium. So, just once more, black and yellow supporters will be seen in front of the stadium rather than supporting our team.

But enough said about the opponent, let's talk about something much more fun: The Borussia. The mood is good after the high win last weekend against Leverkusen and of course the game against Ajax Amsterdam went even better. Tons of criticism (and malice) were uttered after last season's performance in the Champions League and pressure was high before and during the match. It was tough but the victory gave a huge boost to the team. Because, when everyone of the supporters feels like flying, how motivated must our boys feel?
During this week, the two to worry about were Weidenfeller and Gündogan. Both had the flu. Gündogan will stay in Dortmund while Weidenfeller will at least join the team in Hamburg, and then we'll see tomorrow who will be on the pitch. Langerak will do a good job as well, that's for sure!