Finally

By: Chris | July 30th, 2009

HSV have a meaningful match this evening/afternoon, as they take on Danish outfit Randers FC in the Europa League third round qualifying. About eff’ing time I’d say. I’m tired of these friendlies against crap teams like The Little Sisters of the Poor FC, Our Lady of Perpetual Sorrow Daycare Center, and of course, Stuttgart and Bayern.

$Go get\'em Mother Superior!$ There really hasn’t been much to report on since the last post (and by the way, I am putting out an APB for co-blogger Evan–I haven’t heard from him in weeks. Seriously, I hope his pic isn’t showing up on milk cartons in Auz. . .), until yesterday and I decided to write two posts rather than one.

What happened yesterday? HSV finally completed the transfer of center back David Rozehnal from Lazio. The deal would have been done a LOT earlier except Lazio’s batshit-insane owner Claudio Lotito wanted a bigger transfer fee than was previously agreed to. The two sides finally settled on €5million. Rozehnal did not travel with the side to Denmark and will likely make his debut Monday evening versus Fortuna Dusseldorf on August 3 in the opening round of the Pokal.

Randers FC are based in–you guessed it–Randers Denmark, and finished fifth in the Danish SuperLiga in 2008/09. They qualified for the Europa League via UEFA’s Fair Play rankings Here’s how that business works:

The three highest placed national associations in the UEFA Fair Play ranking will each automatically gain an extra qualification berth for the First Qualifying Round, providing they have exceeded the threshold of games played, and have a minimum average score of 8.0. These berths will then be allocated to the highest placed club in that association’s own Fair Play league that has not yet qualified for either the UEFA Champions League or the UEFA Europa League.

Randers have advanced by defeating Northern Ireland outfit Linfield FC 7:0 on aggregate in the first round and FK Sūduva of Lithuania 2:1 (agg.) in the second round.

Here’s the likely starting XI for tonight’s match. Don’t worry if you don’t see a new name or a familiar name–I’m getting to that.

Rost

Demel Boateng Mathijsen Aogo

Trochowski Jarolim Ze Roberto Pitroipa/Castelen

Guerrero Petric

First, I hope that Romeo Castelen gets the nod over Jonathon Pitroipa tonight–dude has been through a shitload of rehab and hard work to get back to playing condition following successive knee injuries. Eljero Elia bruised his knee and will be out for three weeks. Marcell Jansen is hurt, too (his ankle), and did not travel with the side. Marcus Berg is just getting to match-level conditioning and was left home as a result. All, with the exception of Elia, should be ready for the Cup match on Monday and the return leg against Randers next Thursday.

SWAG prediction: Make it 3:1 HSV, with goals by Guerrero, Ze Roberto and Trochowski. Who knows–I haven’t seen any of the matches so far. . .