What’dya expect?

By: Chris | November 17th, 2008

A lapse of concentration, a loss of focus, and no result. For the fourth straight trip away from Hamburg, HSV have seen their collective brain-fart turn into three points for the opposition.

For the eleventh (!) year in a row, HSV travelled to Berlin and left town without a victory, and for the ninth time in those eleven years, we left town with out a point. Not that the match officials were helping us or anything. It seems that on the winning goal, the referee’s assistant raised his flag to notify the referee of a foul (Mathijsen on Voronin), but then lowered the flag after Die Rothosen had stopped for Hertha to take the free kick. BUT, the referee never stopped play, as is his perogative, and Hertha, to their credit, kept playing, resulting in a Domvchiyski goal for the hosts. This link has a very good sequence of photos showing the play–you can make up your own mind. Here is the story behind the photos (keep in mind that the source is one of the local Hamburg papers). HSV almost broke the curse in stoppage time as Jonathon Pitroipa launched a rocket which just struck the crossbar as time was about to expire.

Bad news on the injury front: Nigel de Jong did not play as he experienced some pain in his sore knee prior to the match. He will undergo an MRI on Monday to determine whether there has been further damage to his sprained ACL (anterior cruciate ligament–the ligament on the inside of your knee joint). Really bad news: His injury looks to keep him out for an extended period. Yikes. Good news on the injury front: Glass Joe Marcell Jansen started the match and finished uninjured! Bad news: David Jarolim picked up his fifth yellow in Bundesliga play and now must sit out the Bremen match on 23 November.

Here’s the lineup that took the pitch:

Rost

Demel Reinhardt Mathijsen Jansen

Alex Silva Boateng

Trochowski Jarolim Olic

Petric

Quite a bit different than the lineups I was throwing out there prior to the match. Interesting to see Jerome Boateng playing in the midfield, especially partnering with Alex Silva. I’d like to see that combination a little more often.

Anything positive to take away from another defeat? Well, besides the relative health of the squad, the fact that they held the opposition to *only* 2 goals, and despite a 191-second lapse in concentration, they outplayed Hertha for most of the match.

It will be interesting to see how BMJ rallies the troops after this one. . .

Oh, and the Hamburg Offside celebrated its first anniversary on 13 November. So have a Holsten and celebrate! Skol!