Know Your Minnows

By: Chris | September 18th, 2008

I am toootalllyyy ripping off Ian Rose of The Inverness Caley Thistle Offside, who also used to write a dynamite feature for the UEFA Cup Offside called “Know Your Minnows”, which detailed some of the smaller sides participating in the Intertoto Cup and by extension, the UEFA Cup. Ian, if you ever read my blog, I miss those features, but I suppose there may be a bit of sour grapes after I squeaked out the win in The Offside Euro Bracket Predictor. jk

Tonight, HSV face Romanian minnows AFC Unirea Urziceni at the ‘Bank, who despite being what amounts to a village squad, are currently leading the Romanian Liga 1 with 18 points from 7 matches. Urziceni is a reeeeaaaaallly small town, with a population of just over 17,000 about 50 km southeast of Bucharest. They are managed by beloved former Chelsea star Dan Petrescu, who has managed Unirea since September 2006. Urziceni earned promotion to the Romanian first division in 2006 (prior to Petrescu’s arrival), having only earned promotion to the second division in 2003. The parallels to Hoffenheim in the Bundesliga are pretty clear, except for the billionaire owner, and the fact that Unirea are leading the table and pretty much kicking ass so far. Their big gun is Romanian international Bogdan Mara who has already bagged 5 goals this season (in just seven matches, mind you).

Make no mistake–this is no cupcake for HSV, and Martin Jol has lamented that Unirea was the worst possible opponent for HSV to face. Unirea play a particularly aggressive style which is extremely troubling for HSV, considering their defensive lapses in the Bundesliga so far (7 goals against in 4 league matches). AND, the spectre of CFR Cluj’s victory over Roma in the CL this week is ever present now for larger teams facing smaller sides in European competitions.

Expectations are very high at HSV now, considering the investment in transers this summer. Chairman Berndt Hoffman has stated publicly that nothing short of advancing to the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup will be acceptable this year. Personally, I could care less about the UEFA Cup and think they should focus on winning the Bundesliga this year so they can qualify for the Champions League.

This game is a trap for Hamburg. If they win and give up goals, the alarms will be ringing even louder about the defensive weakness; if they draw, it will be a tremendous letdown on a season that has been almost perfect so far. That said, I think we are looking at 3:2 for HSV, with goals by Olic, Guerrero and Neves.