Hertha Berlin and the Skibbe saga – a depressing tale

Michael Skibbe lasted just seven weeks in charge

Perhaps, in a few decades time, some German writer will transform Michael Skibbe’s excruciatingly brief tenure as manager of Hertha BSC into a bestselling novel, as David Peace so memorably did with Brian Clough and The Damned United. Or perhaps not. Rather than a story of fierce egotism, clashing philosophies and wounded pride, the Skibbe saga has simply been an embarrassing footnote to an increasingly depressing season for Hertha.

Skibbe’s seven week reign over Berlin’s biggest club ended last weekend, granting him the infamy of being the most swiftly sacked coach in Bundesliga history. With a record of five consecutive defeats and just a single goal, it was hardly a premature decision from the Hertha board. What it illustrated however, was how dearly the club has paid for the petty arguments between general manager Michael Preetz and former coach Markus Babbel last Christmas.

Babbel – now manager of Hoffenheim, following the Abramovichian sacking of Holger Stanislawski – left his former club in a whirlwind of childish accusations at the end of last year. His impressive work in leading Hertha to an immediate return to the Bundesliga last season, and his consolidation of that success with a mid table position and a place in the quarter-final of the DFB Pokal was destroyed with one very infantile, and very public, disagreement over who said what when with regard to a contract extension.

Regardless of whether it was Preetz or Babbel who was intially in the right, it is the general manager who must now take the blame for the catastrophic consequences of Babbel’s departure. The phone call to Michael Skibbe, it appears, was made as much in desperation as anything else. Skibbe, who was fired from Eintracht Frankfurt this time last year after a similarly disastrous, goalless run, was certainly not the people’s choice, and in ideal circumstances it is unlikely that he would have been the board’s. Last week saw the new manager’s woeful reign conclusively implode with elimination from the Pokal and a 5-0 away defeat to VfB Stuttgart coming within days of one another.

That the coach had to go eventually was out of the question. The manner of his dismissal, however, arguably says a lot about the influence of the supporter in German football culture. After a group of fans descended on the Hertha headquarters on Sunday morning, demanding an explanation from those responsible, the board’s preferred method of appeasement was a quick and public sacking of the hapless man at the helm. A far cry from the fickle, despotic owner’s axe which is so often the bane of Premier League managers, it was the dictatorial masses who sealed Skibbe’s premature fate.

As for the Hertha’s future, the rare oasis of stability to which the glory days of the Preetz-Babbel era briefly gave rise has now given way to the erratic chaos which is so familiar at the Capital club. Preetz cuts a pitiable figure as he weakly insists that he will not stand down, but not half as pitiable as Hertha’s league position. The fate of Skibbe’s former club Eintracht Frankfurt last season – in which a free fall in the second half of the season saw them go from contenders for a Europa League place to automatic relegation in a matter of months – looms over Berlin. Five consecutive defeats on, and the club finds itself in precisely the same situation they were a month ago: without a manager, and with few viable replacements to choose from.

The so called “manager merry-go-round” continues in the Bundesliga, and once again, it is the clubs at the foot of the table who are made to suffer. At times like this, Hertha fans would be forgiven for looking wistfully to the strong boardroom leadership at clubs like Dortmund and Bayern. It was with a nervous smile that Michael Preetz greeted the press on Sunday, and he has every right to be nervous. One more managerial mistake, and it’ll be his neck on the line.

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