Well, not so much a new striker. A returning striker. Artur Wichniarek has come back, signing a two-year deal. At Armenia Bielefeld he was known as King Artur and was their main line of offense, scoring the goals that kept them tenuously connected to the 1. Bundesliga. Bielefeld was finally relegated last season and the king’s been looking for a new throne.

He also had a spectacularly unspectacular time at Hertha, between his two stints at Bielfeld, appearing in 44 games (mostly as a sub) and scoring only 4 goals. His time at Hertha was mostly noticeable for the leaving- namely, all the shots he took at Dieter Hoeness since then. As late as last year he was bashing Dieter, referring to him as the “main problem” of Hertha.

Well, now Hoeness is out and Artur is back.

It’s hard not to be a little conflicted about this transfer. At 32, Wichniarek is not young, and his previous time at Hertha was not noteable. But his past few years at Bielefeld has shown that he can score goals at Bundesliga level, even when teams know he’s the most potent attacking threat. In that manner, he’s much like the departed Marko Pantelic. And this is also not the Hertha Berlin he left. Not only is Hoeness gone, but the rest of the team is nearly completely changed. There’s a different manager than he left, a new set of players. And at €700,000 it’s not a bad choice, financially, for a proven Bundesliga striker. As Michael Preetz has said, “he knows where the goal is.” (Today’s presentation has given him the number 18, despite the number 9 being free- a sign of another striker also coming, or just reading into things too much?)

So welcome, Artur. Let’s hope this reign is better than the last one.

I honestly thought it wasn’t going to happen. A bit of a boy-who-cries wolf scenario. A player can talk about leaving only so much before I stop believing him, and it seems that my entire time doing this blog he’s been on his way out. But he had a €7 million release clause in his contract this summer, and he played to it. It is startling to me that it’s Hoffenheim that he goes to. They are a young team that plan to be title challengers in the future, and they have a lot of money, but I’d thought that he would go to either a ‘big club’ (Bayern were rumored to be interested) or to England for a large payday. (His salary is set to be bigger at Hoffenheim, but not by a huge amount.)

So, what now? Big Joe was probably one of the best defenders in the Bundesliga last season for us, and his loss is major. There have been times when he’s been a hothead and somewhat of a liability (he is famous for his 3 yellow cards, after all), but last season he was a legend. We will miss him greatly. It hurts, too, that he’s gone to another Bundesliga club. It’d be easier to take if we could pretend that he just wanted to try a new league. Now 31, he probably won’t do so.

So what now? The hope is that Joe is the last departure, but it’s hard to believe in it. There’s rumors swirling about several of our players- I’ve seen (extremely dubious) claims that Manchester United are even interested in making a €12 million bid for Gojko Kacar. It’s disheartening to see the squad that achieved so much get dismantled piece by piece as the bigger clubs come in. At least - and let’s hope that this isn’t another one of my jinxes - it doesn’t seem that Arne Friedrich will be one of the departures.

It’s depressing, though, to focus on the negatives. I hate to see Joe going but at least we got a full fee for him. With a little luck that €7 million will go far. This will be a big, major test for Michael Preetz, to separate himself from his predecessor. If he can use the money to find some hidden gems, instead of just throwing it at Brazil.

One place we might be looking is Tunisia. Amine Chermiti, the young striker we got at the beginning of last season, claims that Hertha are tracking four Tunisian players. He even gives names: Aymen Balbouli, Youssef Mskani, Oussemma Darragi, and Ammar Jemal. I can’t say I know much about any of them, but fortunately, we’ve got an expert in Tunisian football in Rami at Tunisia World Cup Blog, who is always happy to answer questions about players. While Chermiti himself hasn’t still fully settled yet - a long-term injury did not help at all - I think it’s a good sign that we’re looking in some off-the-beaten-path areas for new players. And I have faith that the kid will come good.

Another defensive option is an old favorite of mine, and Lulu’s - Philippe Senderos. This rumor has cropped up before and I’m still enamored by it. The Swiss defender wants out of Arsenal. He’s young and still has quite a lot of good football left in him. The Arsenal fans are all divided on how good he is. My opinion is that he still has the ability that impressed so much in 2006, but his confidence is low. A season under Lulu helped Simunic. Perhaps it can do the same for Senderos?

We’re also in grave need of a striker. In fact, we probably need one more than a defender. There’s talk that one will arrive by the time we get to Austria for our training camp. Bild seems to think that we’ve got our eyes on Adam Szalai, a 21-year-old Hungarian currently playing on Real Madrid’s second team. He’s not unfamiliar with German football, having started his career at VfB Stuttgart. With Madrid buying every attacking player in the world, he might actually play his first team with Hertha.

It’s certainly an exciting time to be a Hertha fan. What kind of excitement still remains to be seen.

More discussion later.

He thinks he knows what’s gone wrong- that in the years since Hertha was promoted, the club focused too much on intra-club issues and ignored how the city around it was changing. Matching the team to the city has long been a goal of Hertha management, but Preetz has a few things on his side compared to the old regime. He was a popular player at Hertha itself, rather than another club, he’s young (for a manager), and he’s got a fresh outlook. The idea that renewal has started is potent in making it actually happen.

What he doesn’t have is much money to renew the squad. One free transfer has been made, but that’s all the activity in the transfer window so far. Training started up again just recently for players not away with their national teams at all- the first Bundesliga club to start, as opposed to slacking on the beach like me- and the only other new face was youngster Fanol Perdedej, who’s been promoted to the first team. The youth squads are set to become an even more important part of the new Hertha. Without the money to buy stars we’ve got to breed them.

As far as outgoing? Well, apparently Josip Simunic wants to leave. He had an incredible last season and I don’t want him to go, but I’m not panicking yet. I’ve been writing this blog for two seasons now, and at each transfer window Joe’s on his way out. So far, he hasn’t left. When things get more serious I’ll actually start to be concerned. For now…

Speaking of national teams, there have been a few Hertha representatives at the U-21 Euro championship that concluded today. Unfortunately, Patrick Ebert, with a toe injury, was left on the bench while his teammates won the tournament, and Gojko Kacar, while personally impressive, left early with Serbia. There’s talk that both of them are on the radar of larger clubs than us, so we’ll see how that goes.

Well, a familiar face, actually. Michael Preetz is Hertha’s former captain and all-time leading scorer. He played 227 games for Hertha from 1996-2003, gaining promotion and retiring. Born in Düsseldorf, he started his career at Fortuna Düsseldorf and spent time at FC Saarbrücken, MSV Duisburg, and SG Wattenscheid 09 before settling (and more) at Hertha. Before Hertha he was known as something of an in-between sort of player: too good for the 2. Bundesliga, not quite good enough for the 1. Bundesliga. It was his time at Hertha, where he arrived at the age of 29, that he shook that reputation, scoring goal after goal and bringing Hertha their first taste of the Champions League.

Even as a player he was known as an intellectual, for a footballer, the sort that read books and not just the sports pages. He’s got a degree in sports management and was vice-president of the player’s union. When he retired from playing he transitioned quickly into management, starting as an assistant under Dieter Hoeness and eventually moving to his last position, in charge of the Hertha player licensing department. He’s also been on the bench next to Lulu for quite a while now.

Clearly, he’s had his eye on this for a long time.

So what does this mean for Hertha, now?

It’s always interesting to see teams that hold onto players past the time they’re on the pitch. It’s been a trend in the Bundesliga, particularly in the more successful teams- Werder Bremen, Bayern Munich, and VfB Stuttgart all have old boys upstairs. There’s something to be said for having ex-players in charge. They would, theoretically, have an attachment to the team and want it to succeed. They’d know the culture and the history. They’d have an investment in its success that goes beyond the monetary. (Theoretically, anyway.)

The question with Preetz is, of course, experience. Hertha’s not an easy club to run and he’s never managed before. However, he has spent the past six years learning how to. A lot of ex-players don’t have that sort of apprenticeship period- Heldt, for example, went straight from the training ground to the decision-making. Preetz has been working to this point since 2003.

He’s been saying all the right things- about teamwork and about Hertha’s place. He’s marketing himself as a clear break from his predecessor. His more recent quotes are about being a team player and not single-handedly running the club, which is definitely a jab at Dieter, who often got accused of attempting to be an autocrat. He’s also talking about the holy grail of Hertha- changing the image of die Alte Dame.

He’s got his work cut out for him on several levels. Image is one thing. There’s also following up on last season, finding players, singing them, making deals in the way that always seemed to elude Dieter Hoeness. There’s dealing with the expectations. But I have hope- he has the energy, ideas, and the coach on his side (who might get yet another new contract).

Besides, I’m always an optimist.

As of this week, he is no longer the manager.

There’s a lot to be said for his tenure. Despite everything, the club has stayed in the Bundesliga since it’s come up, becoming Berlin’s one representative in the top league. Hertha have flirted with Europe, both in Champions League and UEFA Cup form. We’ve had the occasional interesting player wear the blue and white. And, most importantly, Hertha has stayed in the Bundesliga. According to Dieter Hoeness, Hertha was a bit of a mess when he came in, and he’s stabilized it into what we know today.

But that doesn’t mean he’s been universally beloved. I remember a Rafael Honigstein article where he suggested that Uli Hoeness, the notoriously ruthless Bayern Munich general manager, instilled his less-talented brother at the Hertha position to ensure that Berlin never challenged Munich as a Bundesliga power. There have been several different ‘Hoeness out!’ demonstrations throughout the years. And for all the flirtations with Europe and interesting players, there’s mostly debt to show for it. He’s also been known for being paranoid and slightly argumentative, paranoid that his contribution isn’t being noticed and unwilling to let others take other credit.

The heart of the firing seems to be the simplest- players. It’s been Dieter’s job to find players for Hertha, and that’s where he’s been most at odds with possibly his most successful signing, coach Lucien Favre. It’s been felt that Dieter hasn’t been working the Hertha budget in the best possible way, and one could claim that the debt Hertha finds itself in is at least a large way due to his actions in the transfer market. The Hertha history is littered with signings that didn’t quite work out, particularly South Americans that never settled properly. The final straw seems to have been the possibility of Lucas Barrios, the Argentinian striker we were getting close to signing. Hoeness was enthusiastic of signing this untried player from the Chilean league, despite Colo Colo wanting a price close to what Liverpool wanted for Andriy Voronin, a player we already knew worked for us.

In the end, it was Hoeness’ best signing that lead to his downfall- Lucien Favre, the Swiss coach who’s done such a fantastic job in turning the fortunes of the club around this past season. While not quite wanting English-style control of the club, he clearly didn’t see eye-to-eye with Hoeness on the way the club should be going. With Hertha’s good season and interest from bigger clubs, like Hamburg and Bayern Munich, Lulu had a lot of power. He’s a manager that other clubs are interested in and that players are interested in playing for. For a club that hasn’t had much of an identity and that has had trouble attracting good players, that’s clearly something worth keeping.

And that’s what, in the end, the board thought as well. Lulu played the interest from those bigger clubs expertly. Now it will be him and ex-captain Michael Preetz- who’s been Dieter Hoeness’ “apprentice” and gained a degree in sports management since his retirement- to keep the club moving forward.

It’s not an easy situation. Hertha’s not an easy club to run. Time will tell who will prove to be right- Dieter Hoeness, who’s said he’s done all he can, or the new team of Preetz-Gegenbauer-Favre, who think they can do better.

As for me, the simple blogger, thousands of miles away from Berlin, with a substandard grasp of German and trying to figure out what’s going on? Well, I’ve been on the side of Lulu for just about the whole time I’ve been writing this blog. I’m not about to change that now.

This comes on the news that the coaching positions at Hamburg and Bayer Leverkusen, both of whom had courted Lulu, have been filled. Which means that, for now, no one is trying to pry him away. However, president Werner Gegenbauer likely knows that this won’t be the last time his name comes up in conjunction to a bigger job. With this move, it looks like the club will be trying very hard to keep him happy.

I expect there to be more news on Monday. Hoeness has already given an interview to Bild that sounds like there’s a fine story to be told.

No, the most coveted man in the Bundesliga is the son of a farmer from Saint-Barthélemy, Switzerland, our very own Fußball-Lehrer Lucien Favre. After Hertha’s participation in this season’s title race and the eventual 4th-placed finish that he brought us, Lulu is suddenly the name on every tabloid writer’s keyboard.

The current managerial situation in the Bundesliga is somewhat nuts, with something like half the clubs seeming to need a new manager. The biggest names among the managerless (or soon to be managerless) are Hamburg and Bayer Leverkusen, but FC Köln is also in the market for a new one after Christoph Daum was lured back to Turkey and Fenerbahce.

Hertha’s success, combined with Hertha’s low league profile and lack of funds, means that Lucien Favre is, right now, incredibly attractive to a lot of clubs. He got quite a lot out of quite a little. And he has a history of success, as well. It seems that every club he left still thinks very highly of him, and his career in Switzerland is littered with big events- titles, cups, UEFA Cup quarterfinals, promotions, etc. It’s not just one great season in Berlin, it’s a fine career. And now he has what the general managers of those bigger clubs always say they’re looking for. Knowledge of the Bundesliga and ability to speak German. It’s easy to see why he’s so wanted even to those who aren’t as biased as myself.

And there seems to be a limited pool of managers, if the lists in the newspapers are anything to go by. Michael Skibbe seemed to be up for all of them for some reason, but he’s now been appointed new manager of Eintracht Frankfurt. Mirko Slomka, formerly of Schalke, is another one seemingly up for any of those open positions. Bild seems to think that Bruno Labbadia, who is technically currently manager of Leverkusen, is signed on as the new manager of Hamburg. Thomas Doll, who left Dortmund after they finished 13th, is another name that crops up. Bernd Schuster, who is German and did a decent job with Getafe before getting sacked by Real Madrid, occasionally pops his head around there too. It’s not the most inspiring group, so it’s no wonder that Lulu is coveted. As the Berliner Morgenpost points out, Favre’s the only one who hasn’t failed at his last club.

And the situation at Hertha is promising for a club president who hopes to lure him. Hertha have very little in the way of a transfer budget. It’s not a traditional big club of the Bundesliga. It doesn’t have the fanbase or history or memory of much success. A team with any of those things- money, history, fanbase- could perhaps think that prizing Lulu from Hertha is possible in a way that perhaps getting a successful manager from another club isn’t.

Another wrinkle is the brewing showdown between Favre and Dieter Hoeness. The manager, brother of Bayern’s Uli, has been in charge of Hertha since 1997, but his relationship with Lulu (among others) seems to be pretty strained. The Berliner Morgenpost suggests that Lulu gets along much better with former Hertha star Michael Preetz, who’s been being groomed to take over Hoeness’ position when he retires, which was supposed to be in 2010. There’s apparently a meeting going on today (?) where the future of the club is being discussed. Lulu’s position right now is extremely strong due to Hertha’s good season, his popularity among everyone, and the glances being cast towards him by some big names.

The result of all this complication? We may be losing a manager, but to keep a coach.

I still haven’t read up on, much less watched, the final game of the season. I was away at my parent’s house when it was going on and woke up to find the last result I expected, to say the least. I haven’t been able to read a recap yet. It’s a long-standing thing with me and football; when a result is particularly depressing, I don’t even want to acknowledge that it’s existed.

So in the end, we didn’t get that Champions League place that had seemed to be within our grasp. Our budget has been slashed accordingly, and with that, we’ve got to say goodbye to Andriy Voronin and Marko Pantelic. It’s a shame. I don’t think any Hertha fan truly wants to see either of them go, for different reasons. Voronin for the form that propelled us to such an unlikely height. Marko for the heroics of his four years here. Voro goes back to Liverpool, who are likely to offload him somewhere else that can pay, while no one’s quite sure yet where Pante’s future lies.

But a bit of time away from the news has helped me to stop dwelling on the depressing. We may have fallen, embarrassingly, at the final hurdle, but we’ve still had the best season in recent memory. We still went from 10th place to 4th without the flash typically heralding such a rise. The season has made me giddy and excitable. I don’t want to forget how great the past months were despite the past week. I’m still incredibly proud of the team and Lucien Favre for what they’ve accomplished.

Besides, the period of mourning for the Champions League is over. (And realistically, we probably would have ended up in the Europa League anyway, after qualifiers.) It’s time to start thinking about next season. In fact, we’ve already made our first signing- Christoph Janker, formerly of Hoffenheim. Perhaps he’s most famous for showing up late for a doping test, being investigated, and then having the investigation suspended. He’s a defensive all-rounder who, most importantly, was available on a free. Without the extra boost from the Champions League we have very little money to spend, suggested to be as low as €5 million unless we sell one of our prize assets.

The confirmed goings so far are limited to Sofian Chahed, the Berlin-born defender who has been at the club since 1999. He and his agent demanded a salary of over €1 million and that was deemed to be just too much for him (he only played 13 games last season, after all). Janker is his direct replacement. It’s a shame to lose a child of the club, but there are cuts that have to be made. in the same vein, it seems that we’re cutting quite a few youth/amateur players as well.

There’s also the next rumor of Lulu himself going, which I think will be a factor whenever a club bigger than Hertha loses a manager. Thanks to the departure of Martin Jol, that club is currently Hamburg. Bild says that Lulu is now a candidate, but it seems to be built on a case about as strong as the one that suggested he would go to Bayern. Part of it is based on an interview he gave to Swiss newspaper Blick, where he was somewhat bleak about Hertha’s chances next season, especially in regards to finances. I don’t think I can begrudge him a bit of frustration at being expected to improve on this season with nothing to do it with, but he does already seem to be starting on trying to do just that.

Even though Lulu’s still taking a well-earned vacation with his family, there’s still transfer rumors afoot. AS Monaco’s Yohan Mollo, a talented 19-year-old midfielder, is being mentioned. There’s also talk of a possible loan deal for ivan Klasnic, the Croatian striker who had a fine Bundesliga career with Werder Bremen, two kidney transplants, and recently relegated from Ligue 1 with Nantes.

Whatever the case, I’m unlikely to be idle during the summer months.

That doesn’t mean it doesn’t sting.

But it does mean that despite the disappointment, despite the knowledge that it may be another 70-some years before we get this close again, I’m still proud of the team for getting so far. While the nature of our fall may have been disappointing considering it was that final home game of the season, the fact that we were there with a shout in the first place is pretty exciting. The sort of thing that any Hertha fan would have given anything for at the start of this season (or last). And but for a disallowed Pantelic goal…

So, what can be said? The penultimate game was a 0-0 draw against Schalke, a frustrating grinding thing where they had the majority of the possession and not much to do with it. As I predicted, it wasn’t the rollover the pundits were predicting. I’m not surprised, in all honesty, that a draw was the result. Schalke didn’t have much to play for, but that also mean they didn’t have much of a reason to attack, which meant that we didn’t have much of a way to attack.

Much was made of the lineup, with Arne Friedrich and Andriy Voronin starting on the bench. Controversial, but not without sense- Arne’s the inspirational captain and all, but he was out injured for a while and is probably not fully there yet. Voronin’s not quite been back to normal since his suspension and the current attack has been doing things well, especially Pante (showing off to possible suitors?). But in the end, our luck, perhaps, just ran out a bit.

There’s not much to say about the game. Drobny didn’t make a save for 70 minutes. It was boring. It was, well, Schalke. It’ll be interesting, in the future, to see what Magath makes of them.

So, disappointment. But things aren’t over yet. A win on Saturday will get us one of those Champions League spots that can enable us to do so much. A draw between Stuttgart and Bayern would even put us directly there.

In the talk of the Bundesliga run-in this final game was considered to be a walk, as Karlsruhe were considered to be just about relegated. Unfortunately for us, they haven’t been. A win against a distracted Werder Bremen has them still clinging to 1. Bundesliga status, which means a much more fired-up team than we might have faced otherwise. And a severe strain on the Fanfreundschaft that I’ve written so often about. A win for us and we go into the Champions League. A win for them means there’s a chance they can save themselves, thanks to the Bundesliga’s promotional playoffs. There’s only a point between them and 16th-placed Bielefeld.

So we’ll see. We’ll see. Cross your fingers for us anyway.