After a seven-year absence, Hamburger SV are four games away from returning to the Bundesliga under the guidance of the youngest manager in Germany’s top two tiers. Can they overcome past failures and disappointments to complete the job?
“Economically speaking, HSV is the worst investment decision of my life,” Klaus-Michael Kühne, the businessman who invested millions into the city’s biggest football club Hamburger SV, said in May 2018. Weeks later, they were relegated for the first time ever in the professional era of German football.
A lot of money and time has been invested into Hamburger SV in recent years, but it’s frustratingly only led to disappointment and heartache.
Brighter days are seemingly on the horizon under young coach Merlin Polzin, however.
Hamburg born and bred, Polzin – a keen supporter of HSV since childhood – is close to leading his club back to the Bundesliga after seven years of second-tier football. With four league games remaining in 2024-25, Hamburg need nine points to guarantee automatic promotion to the top flight.
As one of Germany’s oldest clubs, HSV have been nicknamed “der Dino” (the Dinosaur). They could be set for a return from Bundesliga extinction.
Support Can’t Guarantee Promotion
Hamburger SV are six-time champions of Germany, with half of those coming in the Bundesliga era. The early 1980s saw them reign supreme, winning the Bundesliga title in back-to-back campaigns in 1981-82 and 1982-83, while the latter season also saw them win the European Cup for the only time in their history.
It’s been a tough time to be an HSV fan, though their historic strength means there are plenty of them. A recent report by the Bundesliga stated they are the seventh-most supported club in German football, with approximately 110,000 members. Support doesn’t equate to prowess, quite clearly, as two of the teams above them in the rankings – Schalke (190,400) and Köln (140,000) – are also currently in the second tier.
Unlike Köln (one season) and Schalke (two seasons), Hamburg have been stuck in 2. Bundesliga for quite a while now. This is their seventh successive campaign in the second tier following the first relegation ever from the Bundesliga in 2017-18, which ended 55 seasons in the competition following its inaugural campaign in 1963-64. Those 55 years made Hamburg the most established top-flight club in Germany at the time – the only team to play in every Bundesliga season since it was created. It’s proved difficult to make it back, though.
So calamitously unlucky were some of Hamburg’s nearly moments over the past six previous seasons that many fans would be forgiven for thinking they’d be stuck there forever.
Each of their first three seasons of second-tier football saw them finish fourth in a league where the top two win automatic promotion and third compete in a two-legged play-off against the team to finish 16th in the Bundesliga. Each of those saw Hamburg within two wins of automatic promotion – close, but not close enough.
They went even closer in the following two seasons under Tim Walter, with their agonising failure to win promotion almost comically cruel on HSV.
After reaching the promotion play-off in 2021-22, Hamburg sensationally won 1-0 away at Hertha BSC and just needed to draw the second leg in front of their own fans. They lost 2-0, and their downfall was orchestrated by a club legend, Felix Magath. Making nearly 400 competitive appearances over 10 years as a player for HSV, it was Magath who scored the winner in the 1983 European Cup final against Juventus.
The disappointment of the following season was somehow arguably even worse for Hamburg. After beating Sandhausen 1-0 on the final day, they moved into the automatic promotion places and secured their spot back in the Bundesliga. Or so their fans thought.
Storming onto the pitch to wildly celebrate their achievement, the HSV supporters were stunned when the stadium loudspeaker announced that promotion rivals Heidenheim had sensationally scored two goals in added time – the winner in the 99th minute – to steal the title and push Hamburg down into third behind Darmstadt. Another play-off beckoned.
HSV boss Tim Walter attempts to calm supporters who think they’ve won promotion to the Bundesliga. Spoiler alert: they hadn’t.They went on to lose the play-off with a whimper, going down 6-1 to top-flight club VfB Stuttgart over two legs, condemning them to another season of 2. Bundesliga football.
That campaign, 2023-24, served up yet more embarrassment for HSV, as they could only finish fourth and saw city rivals St. Pauli win the league and promotion to the Bundesliga on a fraction of the budget.
The Polzin Effect
At just 34 years old, Merlin Polzin is the youngest manager in the top two tiers of German league football. Retiring as a player at the age of 21 due to arthritis in his toes, Polzin’s focus quickly shifted to coaching.
After spells coaching in the HSV academy, his big breakthrough came in October 2017 when Daniel Thioune was named as head coach at third-tier club VfL Osnabrück and named a young Polzin as his assistant.
Thioune eventually became HSV head coach ahead of their third season of 2. Bundesliga football, taking Polzin with him. While Thioune lasted less than a season as manager, Polzin remained as assistant under Walter and then Steffen Baumgart, before replacing the latter as head coach in November last year. First appointed as caretaker, Polzin was then announced as permanent boss at the end of December following a brilliant 5-0 win over Greuther Fürth.
Despite a very short spell in caretaker charge between the Walter and Baumgart spells, this was Polzin’s first chance as a full-time head coach – one that he’s grabbed with both hands.
Merlin Polzin: The Wizard of HamburgWhen Baumgart was dismissed on 24 November, HSV were in danger of falling away from the leading pack in 2. Bundesliga. Although only four points off leaders Paderborn with 13 games played, Hamburg were eighth and Baumgart had overseen a downturn in form. His final four games saw them fail to secure a win (two draws, two defeats) despite holding a lead in three of them.
Polzin steadied the ship with two wins and two draws before his position became permanent. Since his first game in charge of the club on 1 December versus Karlsruher SC, HSV have won more points than any other club in the division (33), while his points-per-game average of 1.94 is higher than any of his predecessors in the second tier.
Hamburg are a side who like to see a lot of the ball, which has been the case under both coaches this season. Slow and patient in their build-up, HSV have completed the most passes (12,430) and tallied the most open-play sequences of 10+ passes (385) in the league, while their average possession figure of 55.2% is only second to promotion rivals FC Magdeburg (58.2%).
That control has also extended to game state, with Hamburg holding a leading position for 46% of ball-in-play time this season – at least 10% more than any other side.
A key element of their control lies in Hamburg’s desire to stretch the pitch and get the ball into wide areas, with no team in 2. Bundesliga this season averaging a smaller proportion of open-play touches (22.5%) or chances created (26.6%) in the middle third of the pitch.
Their biggest threat has undoubtedly come from the left side, with winger Jean-Luc Dompé leading the competition rankings for both assists (11) and open-play chances created (53). Supporting him is Miro Muheim, who has played most of the season at left-back and chipped in with an impressive eight assists of his own.
While not the most-prolific team in terms of crossing – five teams have attempted more open-play crosses than their 448 – they can be deadly when they get the ball out wide and deliver it into the box. Much of that stems from having 6-foot-5 striker Davie Selke on the end of them.
Land of the Giants
A lot was expected from Selke when he broke through at Werder Bremen in 2013 as an 18-year-old. He would eventually become one of only 18 players in the club’s Bundesliga history to score in the competition before their 20th birthday.
Despite showing plenty of promise in his early years, scoring 10 times in 2014-15 for Werder before a further 10 the season after at RB Leipzig in the second tier following a then-record transfer for a 2. Bundesliga player (€8 million), Selke struggled to achieve what was hoped of him.
Once a regular in Germany’s youth teams, Selke hasn’t won a cap for the senior national side. But his move to HSV and potential promotion thanks to his incredible scoring form could eventually change that.
Upon moving to Hamburg on a free transfer last summer following relegation with Köln, Selke was reunited with his former Köln coach, Baumgart. HSV had acted quickly to sign the striker in the hope of him forming a deadly partnership with the prolific Robert Glatzel, but those plans were scuppered in October when the latter – another giant of a striker at 6-foot-4 tall – suffered a serious hip injury. He has spent the majority of the 2024-25 campaign on the sidelines.
Glatzel had been the biggest of thorns in the side of 2. Bundesliga defences since signing for HSV in 2021. Across the three seasons prior to this one, the journeyman scored 63 goals in 100 league appearances, 28 more than any other player. Obviously, those goals didn’t lead to promotion, but with the addition of Selke, it was hoped they could finally drag themselves over the line.
Selke has quickly become a fan favourite at Volksparkstadion, scoring 19 times in 27 league appearances and averaging a goal every 88 minutes to lead the 2. Bundesliga scoring charts. Incredibly, 10 of those 19 goals have been headers, three more than any other player in the top two tiers in Germany, England, Italy, Spain and France.
Hamburg’s consistent strategy of getting the ball into wide areas and firing crosses into their striker has proved profitable. Overall, this season they have assisted 15 goals via open-play crosses, which is nearly double that of any other team in the competition (Magdeburg, with eight, have the next most).
And just in case Selke wasn’t proving enough of a headache for HSV’s opponents, Glatzel has returned from injury at the perfect time as they look to put a seal on their great season and win promotion. His substitute appearance in the vital 3-0 win over Magdeburg on 14 March ended a spell of just over five months on the sidelines, and he scored his first goal since returning in the 3-0 away win at Nürnberg three weeks later.
Seventh Time Lucky?
The next four weeks are undoubtedly huge for Hamburger SV and expectations are high considering their final four games are all against teams currently ninth or lower in the table.
They sit a point off leaders Köln with a four-point gap between themselves and third-place Magdeburg; automatic promotion is in their hands. Across the 16 seasons since the relegation play-off was reintroduced, only Holstein Kiel (in 2020-21) have fumbled a lead of 4+ points over third place this late into the season.
Three wins will guarantee HSV promotion and status as a Bundesliga club for the first time since 2018, but they’ve been in a similar position before and failed.
In 2018-19, they were well-positioned to make an immediate return to the Bundesliga with four games remaining. Placed second behind Köln (as they are now, six years later) going into the final four matchdays, they lost three of their final four matches and ended in fourth place, agonisingly a single point off automatic promotion or even the play-off spot.
The Opta supercomputer is confident they can do it this time around, though. The latest projections see HSV finish inside the top two and win automatic promotion 89.1% of the time, while they even overhaul Köln in 45.7% of the 10,000 simulations.
Failure is a word that has been closely associated with Hamburg over the last seven years, but this season feels different. HSV’s return to the Bundesliga would cause a big impact, but this time it’s bringing the dinosaurs back.
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Merlin Magic: Rookie Merlin Polzin Close to Leading Hamburger SV Back to the Bundesliga Opta Analyst.
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