Last one for a week
By: Chris | July 6th, 2008
To the regular readers, I am going on holiday with my family for a week, beginning tomorrow (yep-I know pretty short holiday by Continental standards, but the trip will manage to consume a third of my holiday time for the year. SIGH. But I digress. . .) so this is going to be it for a week. And of course, this will be the week that VDV transfers out and somebody big transfers in. A similar situation ocurred when I went on holiday at Thanksgiving in November–Huub Stevens announced he was leaving the club.
Training for the upcoming season has commenced, and all players who weren’t in the Euro had to report. Speaking of reports, there’s a new one today that says Newcastle and ex-HSV hero Kevin Keegan are hot on the trail of Hamburg defender Joris Mathijsen, who played quite well in the Euro. All of the HSV guys who played, played well, which necessarily excludes Piotr Trochowski, who did not get off the bench for Germany. And what’s that say about Trocho’s international future (in Low’s eyes) given that he never left the bench, especially considering the defense for Germany was swiss cheese in the Euro? Sunderland and Blackburn are reportedly also in the market for Mathijsen. His transfer fee is said to be £10M. Good chunk of change, but I really like Mathijsen. If nothing else he’s Dutch; but really, he is steady and he always marks the opposing team’s top forward, usually with great success–witness Luca Toni’s performances versus HSV last season (Toni was entirely absent from the score sheet).
A new player for Rafael van Der Vaart–Atletico Madrid
Another interview from this past week saw new manager BMJ (Big Martin Jol) saying all the right things. Some highlights:
“All players start with a clean slate with me”–referring directly to Mohamed Zidan (whose transfer to a Saudi club is not done-and-dusted, as was reported here earlier) and Thimothee Atouba.
“Rafael van Der Vaart wants to stay at HSV”–This is looking more and more like a reality as the transfer season gets into full swing. He qualified that statement by later saying that if a big club in Spain (specifically naming Real and Barcelona, and did not mention any English sides) came calling and the money were right, HSV would have to listen as it would make good business sense for the club. He also sees VDV among the names of the all-time greats at Hamburg–names like Uwe Seeler and Manfred Kaltz. You know guys who played their whole careers with the club.
“I had him already at Tottenham. He is one of the best with the ball in his own end”–On Thimothee Atouba. I will be the first to admit that I can’t stand Atouba and his petulance–frankly, he doesn’t play well enough to act like a prima donna. I really would like to see him transfer out and get some cash for him, but barring that, if BMJ can get him to play, more power to him.
And finally, “Last season, the defense was there. We just need more gates”–Brilliance. Pure brilliance. No wonder had to wait to lock up such an insightful manager.
Category: Team News
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