After huge change of personnel in the summer and trusting too many youngsters Hamburger were expected to struggle after the relegation from the top flight and this turned out to be an extremely painful season for the team. In the end top 3 finish was missed by a single point, which hurts even more considering that come the end of February Hamburger were sitting in first place.
The fact that the team’s best centre-back Papadopolous missed pretty much the entire campaign, with his regular partner Jung also out for more than half of the games, didn’t help.
Going forward there were also issues and, after failing to score in 5 of their opening 10 games, coach Titz was sacked, with Hannes Wolf replacing him. Under the new coach Hamburger climbed from mid-table to first place in no time as Wolf’s reign began with 6 wins and a draw.
With 4 more wins in the first 7 rounds after the winter break Hamburger climbed in first place with just 10 rounds left, the team also went all the way to the German Cup semi-final.
However, this was when the nightmare begun – announcements that main playmaker Holtby and top goalscorer Lassogga will be sold in the summer saw both players rebelling and refusing to play. This created toxic atmosphere and run of 3 draws and 6 defeats between rounds 26 and 33 saw Hamburger not only lose top spot, but drop out of the top 3 altogether.
Hamburger obviously need to work on their off-the-field issues this summer and they also need to find new manager and committed players for next season. All this hints that challenging for promotion will be a hard task once again.
