In the past I have been a vocal supporter of Pal Dardai during his tenures as coach of Hertha BSC. I feel that his shortcomings are overstated and his qualities are ignored or downplayed as insignificant.

After he left his position for the first time in 2019, Hertha fell from Europa League contender into lower midfield and relegation positions during the seasons 2019/20 and the first half of 2020/21.

In January 2021, when Preetz and Labbadia left, he returned and saved Hertha from relegation with a crazy run of 5 unbeaten matches in 12 days after the entire staff had to get into quarantine for 2 weeks in the middle of the season. In the summer the club appointed Fredi Bobic, making him the best paid director of football in the Bundesliga.

Under Bobic the quality of Herthas squad deteriorated, but Dardai still managed to stay above the relegation zone when he got sacked in late 2021. What came after was the desastrous appointment of Tayfun Korkut, who promised proactive football. He managed to not win any of the 10 games he coached in 2022. His successor Felix Magath saved Hertha from relegation in dramatic fashion after beating Hamburg in the releagtion play offs.

What followed was the appointment of Sandro Schwarz as Hertha manager, in my opinion a very capable manager. Hertha was near the relegation spots but never seemed to be completely outplayed. The sentiment was that good results would follow if Hertha continued playing the way they did. Unfortunately performances went downward and Schwarz was replaced by Pal Dardai after losing 5-2 against Schalke. Dardai could not save Hertha from relegation anymore and Hertha went down.

Now, I could summarise the entire Season of 2023/24, but I think everyone reading this remembers last year quite well. In my opinion the season was not as bad as the critics made it out to be. Winkler, Maza and Klemens were integrated into the squad. The team grew together as a unit and regained the connection with the fans. A so called "Übergangsjahr".

The discussion around Dardai was centered around his tactics: Midfield press, long balls and counterattacking football. Hertha scored 69 goals in the league, more than the 'progressive' possession oriented teams like Hamburg and St. Pauli. So the problem was clearly not his attacking approach, but his defensive stability, which was never critisised. Dardai may have had Reese, but Hertha had no real midfield, often playing a 4-4-2 with 2 centre backs (Dardai and Klemens) as a double pivot due to lack of options.

Now Hertha have had 20 matches in the league under Fiel. Conceding the same amount of goals and scoring less, with 1 point less than Dardai after 20 matches, playing possession based football. I'm still waiting for kicker to write a damning verdict of Fiel calling his tactical approach wrong with the headline "Kein Konzept", considering he is performing worse than his predecessor.

My questions are:

• Is this tactical approach the right approach?
• Would Dardai have performed worse?
• Did performances ever get better after getting rid of him?

This formation really worked wonders.

Coming to Berlin at the start of May, just wondering how easy it would be to get tickets to a game? Thanks in advance.

Ok 4 of us heading over to this game from Ireland. Game still down for the Sunday. We arrive on the Friday and leave Sunday night

Have been in touch with club see when tickets are available and they told me to keep eye on their website

Any ideas as to when they will go on sale and will game more than likely be switched to the Saturday.

Have also been in touch with the Hertha Inters on Instagram see if possibly get into the Ostkurve.

We are not tourist fans we're football fans so want to sit /stand and bounce with real fans. Also want to experience pre and post match drinks.

We are staying in Alexanderplatz and not of the age for clubbing more bars with good beer and crack, the Irish crack (Google it)

Any help appreciated & bars to visit while in Berlin. We've all visit Berlin before so want to get a more local feel to it

cheers from Ireland

Last week, I was in Berlin, and my sister wanted to buy a Hertha Berlin jersey for her boyfriend.

She decided to get the special edition jersey released in memory of the Hertha Berlin president from the store inside Mall of Berlin. When she went to the store, they told her there was only one jersey left in stock.

On the back of this jersey, it said ‘Stammgast.’ When she asked who Stammgast was, the store employee told her that he was a promising young winger. So, my sister bought the jersey.

It didn’t take us long to realize that there is no player named Stammgast. Why would the store employee mislead my sister like this? Could this jersey have been a custom order for someone with the last name ‘Stammgast’? If that’s the case, it’s both infuriating and hilarious. Lol

Hey guys, So Im designing a sticker for my friends and for that Im looking for moments from the last years that were really strange. Right Now, what I was thinking was stuff like the offside given to paderborn in the beginning last week, or the penalty in the end against köln, where christensen unfortunately accidentally fouled the köln guy in the pokal. Are there other Moments like this that would come to your mind?

Good evening everyone. In the next semester I will be writing my bachelor thesis about the financing of stadiums with the focus on the planned new Hertha stadium. To get some additional information and insights on different topics surrounding Hertha, I’ve originally planned to do some short interviews with journalists, who I know are close to Hertha, but my inquiries weren’t successful yet.

So far I asked: -Marc Schwitzky -the guys from Hertha Base -the initiative Blau Weisses Stadion

I thought maybe you guys might know some more people worth asking. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Wie kann man bei eigenen Ecken immer so offen hinten sein?!? Generell sieht man das die Mannschaft Qualität hat, aber taktisch passt das wirklich null. Keine Reaktion auf gegnerische Umstellungen und generell stimmen die Laufwege offensiv viel zu selten. Von der Verteidigung muss ich glaube ich gar nicht erst anfangen…

Hey All! I am visiting Berlin from NYC in April and will be attending the Hertha/Darmstadt match.

I am curious how the pre match experience is like around the stadium. Are there bars around the stadium? Any info is much appreciated!

Looking forward to the match!

Hi, I will be finally back in Berlin and want to visit the Game Hertha against Kaiserslautern. I was just checking the Ticketshop and it seems somehow odd to me that you cannot buy tickets for sections 9 to 25. Are they really sold out or not yet available to the general public?! Does anybody know when these section will become available?

Ich bin seit der WM 2006 durch Arne Friedrich (damaliger Lieblingsspieler) Hertha Fan und seit meinem 8ten Lebensjahr mittlerweile über 16 Jahre Mitglied des Vereins und das, obwohl ich nie auch nur annähernd in Berlin gelebt habe. Ich liebe den Verein über alles und supporte ihn auch egal ob in der ersten Liga oder in der zweiten Liga. Aber ich fange an so langsam den Glauben und die Hoffnung an den Verein zu verlieren und sehe nicht, wie wir in naher Zukunft auch nur in die Nähe der ersten Liga kommen sollen, geschweige denn irgendwie wieder erfolgreich werden. Ich halte die derzeitigen Verantwortlichen auf jeglicher Ebene nicht in der Lage uns aus dem hinterlassenen Scherbenhaufen wieder herauszuholen und die derzeitigen Strukturen erinnern mich an die Zeit unter Fredi Bobic (Transformation von Bobic & Friends zu Zecke & Friends). Ich könnte jetzt auch ausholen, was mir alles missfällt, aber das würde hier den Rahmen sprengen. Aus diesem Grund wollte ich einfach mal in die Runde fragen, was euch bezüglich Hertha Mut für die Zukunft gibt? Denkt ihr, wir werden auch wieder positive Zeiten erleben oder wird der Negativstrudel niemals enden und wir durchlaufen letztendlich ein ähnliches Schicksal wie 1860 München?

Eine Zeit lang geisterten ja Gerüchte über einen Leihabgang von Tabakovic durch die Presse die so keinen Sinn gemacht haben. Fakt ist nämlich, dass laut FIFA Spieler in einer Saison nur für zwei verschiedene Mannschaften auflaufen dürfen. Hertha ist also der einzige Verein zu dem er theoretisch für die Rückrunde wechseln kann.

Vor gut drei Wochen wiegelte Weber noch ab, doch nun hat sich einiges verändert.

Zum einen war wohl eigentlich nicht mit einem Kanga Verkauf im Winter zu rechnen, zum anderen könnte auch Kenny noch etwas Geld bescheren. Auch die ohnehin schwierige Situation von Haris in Hoffenheim ist noch einmal komplizierter geworden. Er war ohnehin nur Ergänzungsspieler und nach den Winterzugängen von Orban und Yardimci hat er nun womöglich 6 Stürmer vor der Nase (auch wenn einige davon auch auf anderen Positionen eingesetzt werden). Möglich also, dass er selbst langsam unzufrieden wird und sich nochmal für einen Wechsel im Sommer empfehlen will. Auch Hoffenheim, die scheinbar keinen Bedarf für ihn haben, könnte so womöglich ohne großen Verlust herauskommen.

Lohnt sich vielleicht also ein neuer Anlauf um für die Rückrunde Reesovic noch einmal aufleben zu lassen?