After an eventful first few months as Berlin’s new boss, Hertha managing director Fredi Bobic dampened expectations and warned against ambitious goals: “As always, it is not easy to take over a new club. You were at the bottom of the table and fought against relegation and then managed to stay in the league, “Bobic told the Forbes-Magazine.
At the moment one has to be “realistic” despite the high investments of financier Lars Windhorst. This has paid about 375 million euros to Hertha since 2019, but success has not yet set in despite player transfers of more than 160 million euros.
“A large part of the investment is gone anyway. The investor’s money cannot only be spent on players,” said Bobic about the money with which Windhorst has secured 64.7 percent of the shares in Hertha BSC GmbH & Co. KGaA. In the summer, the Berliners made a profound upheaval in the squad and parted ways with big earners such as Matheus Cunha and Jhon Cordoba. “The mentality always beats the quality,” said Bobic.
The start of the new season was still unsuccessful, with 13 points in eleven games, currently only 13th place. Bobic doesn’t want to focus only on the professional squad: “One of our goals this summer was not only to invest in the first team, but also to increase the budget for the second team and the academy.”
Bobic: “Bayern Munich are very aggressive here”
Accordingly, it has been the case in the past that promising players left the club far too early. “The city of Berlin is full of recruits for other clubs. Bayern Munich, for example, is very aggressive here.” With Nemanja Motika and Torben Rhein, there are two former Hertha players in the Bayern Reserve squad.
Bobic is aware of the fact that the gap to the record champions cannot be closed in the foreseeable future: “First of all, they do a good job at Bayern. Then a lot depends on the Champions League. If you play there for 20 or 25 years in a row , the gap will be very large. ” His goal is “to have a little more money available every year and to grow in a healthy way”. The 50 + 1 rule “plays a major role” and is supported, “but I also have to be realistic: the rule will fall at some point”.
Clarifying the stadium issue should also help in the further development of the club. “I’m working on getting a new stadium and I’m in constant contact with the new Berlin Senate.” The Olympic Stadium is “a great stadium for our big games or the DFB Cup final. But in everyday life it is not ideal for us”.
For a new building they want to “invest our own money and not take anything from the taxpayer”. The first signals are positive: “Although football is only about results, we always have to keep an eye on the long-term project. The new stadium could be a turning point. At the moment, the most important thing is to get out of the pandemic healthy.”
