Bundesliga relegated Hertha BSC submitted the documents required for the license to the German Football League DFL on Wednesday. When you listen to President Kay Bernstein, nothing can go wrong. “We say: We’ll get the license and start in the second division!” Bernstein said on Deutschlandfunk. In a “perfect world” Hertha would get the license next week, he added, although Hertha’s world would probably be more perfect if the license was already there. Above all, it was necessary to cover liquidity bottlenecks of allegedly 20 million euros and to explain how a bond of 40 million euros due in November should be serviced. If you can’t do it ad hoc, you have to “have detention like at school,” said Bernstein.
That doesn’t change a core personality: On Thursday, Hertha announced that Pal Dardai, 47, would remain in office as head coach. The crowd favorite had taken over six games before the end of the relegation season. “I have the feeling that we all want to and will work together for the good of Hertha BSC,” said Dardai. Javier Caceres
Almabtrieb
Hands over your face: Arminia Bielefeld is relegated to league three.
(Photo: Ulrich Hufnagel/Imago)
As the second division Arminia Bielefeld had lost the first leg of the relegation at third division SV Wehen Wiesbaden 0: 4, the future sports director Michael Mutzel, 43 (formerly Hamburger SV), called club president Rainer Schütte and said: “Then it will be the third division, I still have really keen on the Arminia.”
Apparently it was important to ex-professional Mutzel to let his new club know that he had no doubts. And after Bielefeld’s 2-1 defeat in the second leg at home, one thing is certain: Arminia will be relegated for the second time in twelve months and will fall in free fall from the first to the third division. Mutzel has eight weeks to recompose the entire squad with manageable means before the start of the season. Almost all player contracts end after relegation.
After 35 million euros in television money in the first and 19 million in the second, Arminia only receives 1.3 million in the third. It would be nice to go back up again. Bielefeld has changed leagues 23 times since the Bundesliga was introduced in 1963. Motto: Always up and down. Ulrich Hartmann
Pele vs Expert
Colleagues: Cottbus coach Claus-Dieter “Pele” Wollitz (left) and Unterhaching’s game director Sandro Wagner.
(Photo: Robert Michael/dpa)
The playoff first leg for the Promotion to the third division between Energie Cottbus and SpVgg Unterhaching offered the duel of two interesting coaches. The old warhorse Claus-Dieter “Pele” Wollitz, 57, lost 1: 2 against the 22-year-old TV expert Sandro Wagner – and got upset about the time game of Hachinger, who was in the lead from the 37th minute: “I wish in more fairness in certain situations. There were too many interruptions,” complained Wollitz. “If you are injured, you have to be treated. But four times? And four times nothing happens? I think that’s a bit much.”
Wagner apologized for the most controversial scene with a long back and forth about his battered defender David Pisot: “The scene made me uncomfortable, as a young coach I didn’t know how to react: one says he has to go, the other says , he has to stay.” Wagner himself was surprised: “We’ve never had seven or eight boys having cramps from the 30th or 40th minute. Something wasn’t right in the preparation.” Let’s see how fit Haching is in the second leg on Sunday. Markus Schäflein
