We won.

The first time since August- against Brøndby, way back when. All those weeks of things getting worse and worse, of less and less confidence, of more and more crap. And while this result only matters a little (we’re still rock bottom in the league), it’s such a nice result to have.

Of course, we went about it in the most difficult way possible. After 3 minutes we were down a goal, conceding from just the first corner. The unmarked Michael Papadopulos put the ball into the net and I assumed it was another one of those games.

But we had a couple of weapons- Valeri Domovchiyski and Artur Wichniarek. Yes, you read me correctly- Artur Wichniarek. The Pole has been the symbol of everything that has gone wrong about Hertha this season, an example of an old mistake, the striker with no goals and nothing to show for the several months he’s been in the city. But in Heerenveen, he was what we hoped he’d be in July, setting up two goals for young Domo before scoring the winner himself in injury time.

Between that we’d done well in the game, especially after equalizing in the 21st minute, but being Hertha we of course went into the break behind, after Papadopulos scored again in the 36th minute.

But! Unlike Hertha of late, we came back. We came back twice. We fought back, scored an equalizer, scored a winner. True, it’s only against a team who’s struggling in their own league, but we didn’t manage anything when we played them in Berlin. And a win, an actual win, is just fantastic. We’re now 2nd in the group, in good spirits heading into the Köln match, and we could possibly end up in the next round after all after the other result (and a better head-to-head with Heerenveen).

Plus, Wichniarek. I’ve had a theory that things will get better as soon as Wichniarek starts performing. He’s been the symbol of all that’s gone wrong in Berlin, but he’s not a bad player. He’s got a fine record at Bielefeld and he knows how to score. But he’s had a block at Berlin all the times he’s been here.

Is it gone now, with today’s game? It’s probably too early to say. But it’s my fervent hope that now that King Artur’s broken his duck, Hertha’s luck will turn around.

Of course, this isn’t last season and we’re nowhere near the upper reaches of the Bundesliga. We’re in worse form than Heerenveen, certainly, as they won a game last weekend, going 3-0 over Den Haag.

As is so often the case, we’ll be a bit injury-hit for our trip to the Netherlands, with Pal Dardai, Gojko Kacar, and Rasmus Bengtsson (as well as longer-term injuries Florian Kringe and Timo Ochs) not making the trip. We’ll also be without Patrick Ebert, who got two yellows when Heerenveen came to visit and is suspended. This could mean some playing time for some youngsters- Lennart Hartmann, Sascha Bigalke and Fanol Perdedaj are all in the squad- but I’m not holding my breath.

While this is perhaps not as necessary as Saturday’s game against FC Köln, I’d love to have any sort of result. Hopefully the players will as well. Any sort of confidence boost going into the Köln game is a good one. For the players as well as the fans.

As the crisis in the capital goes on, I’m sure we’ll see more and more fanciful suggestions as how to pull ourselves out of it in the tabloids. It’ll be interesting as to how they’ll top what I’ve seen today, though. Bild says that we want ex-Bayern Munich striker Roy Makaay, currently warming the bench at Feyenoord. He definitely knows where the goal is, but he’s also 34 and that number is unlikely to go lower.

Not to be outdone by the Germans, the Daily Mail is reporting that we’ve made a lucrative offer for Sol Campbell. Yes, that Sol Campbell. Undoubtedly talented, undoubtedly eccentric, and just having left the Notts County experiment by mutual consent after playing only one game in League Two. Apparently he’s hoping that the special tribunal that meets next week will let him join a new club, and even more oddly, we apparently have a lot of money to throw at him.

I don’t even know how to react to that kind of news.

If you’re in the States and have DirecTV, you’re in luck. Hertha’s being televised among their list of games. Check your listings and cross your fingers.

Five games played; four lost. Seventeenth place. Most recently in Mainz, where a 1-0 lead in the 80th minute (thanks to Maxi Nicu) turned into a 2-1 loss. Confidence is low. And, really, that’s the crucial thing.

Work caused me to miss last game, but it seems like it was just a collapse after cruising. After that game, and after watching Hertha play pretty decently against Bremen, it seems that the problem is truly that most elusive of elements, confidence.

Confidence and momentum brought Hertha to where they were last season. The lack of it is hurting them now. It’s hard to know how to fix it. What they really need to do is win a game, but it seems that they need to win a game to be able to win a game.

(Also, Hertha players need to STOP GETTING INJURED. The most recent victim is Florian Kringe, who will be out for two months with a foot injury sustained against Mainz, which is why Nicu was playing at all.)

The next chance to win a game is the opening round of the Europa League group stages tomorrow. Latvian champions FK Ventspils are the visitors. Currently, they’re second in the soon-to-finish Latvian season. On paper, they’re the easiest of our group (which also includes Heerenveen of the Netherlands and Sporting of Portugal), especially since this is the home game. They’re in a bit of turmoil themselves, with a betting scandal surrounding a couple of their regulars who did not make the trip to Berlin.

Team news is that while Gojko Kacar is still injured, and it seems that Patrick Ebert is as well, but Arne Friedrich is back.

All we can do, all I can do, is hope, really. And I do feel it- in the back of my head, even though it’s pretty dark right now, I believe that this will turn around. Maybe it’s misplaced optimism. But…

But that was last season, and this is now, and we haven’t quite got back that mentality that made us so difficult to actually defeat. Still, though, this was an improved performance from the prior two games. Not that that’s saying much. And now it’s been 3 in a row in the Bundesliga without a win.

The first half was fast-paced, if not always noteable. We actually had the first good chance, with Tim Wiese in the Bremen goal saving well from Max Nicu. Our own Jaroslav Drobny got his own chances to shine, saving well from my favorite name on the pitch Philipp Bargfrede and Werder’s new signing, the elf Marko Marin. But the teams were level going into the half.

Emboldened, we came out strong in the second, certainly the better of the two teams. The most noteable moment of the opening bits was the non-call for the ever-unlucky Artur Wichniarek. The Pole looked to be racing through on goal when he was felled by Wiese, but no whistle was given. Watching it from where I was, and the replays, it looked like a clear penalty, and the Spanish commentators on ESPN 360 seemed to agree (although I haven’t taken Spanish since high school, and never learned any football commentary words). But the Pole’s bad luck continued. Another good spell from us ended in a goal from Bremen.

It was a sucker-punch, to be sure, a quick counter-attack resulting in a goal for another one of German football’s great young hopes, Mesut Özil. It threw us for a loop and we didn’t quite recover until after the returned Tim Borowski doubled the lead. Then we seemed to remember that we, too, could once make things happen, and Lukasz Piszczek – helped by excellent work from Gojko Kacar – made it a game again. 2-1 and we looked like we might still get something out of it, only for Naldo to pop up with a goal quite similar to the first one.

There was just enough time for Patrick Ebert to score a fantastic goal with the last kick of the game, but that wasn’t enough for any points and the game ended 2-3. Sigh.

In general, I thought we were better, more lively, but it’s still the same in the end. To me, the most positive thing was that we didn’t give up- up until the very end, we were fighting back. Against a less-strong team, we could have gotten something. We’re still not where we should be, and we are giving away somewhat-soft goals (watching Mesut Özil slice through our defense was depressing), but there’s the slightest cause for hope, right? Right?

Other thoughts: ESPN 360 is amazing. Thank you, Comcast, for adding it. Even though the game was delayed and in Spanish, it was still awesome. Leagues, take note- this is how things should be done. I would also very much like Artur Wichniarek to score a goal. Even though attacks kept breaking down when they got to him, which was frustrating, I kept feeling for him. The more things didn’t go his way the more I wanted them to. I’m softhearted, I guess, but I think a goal for König Artur would be not only good for him, but good for the team. They need that self-confidence.

But that was yesterday. Today, it’s all about the closing of the summer transfer window, with the big Hertha news being that we signed not one, but three new players.

First, there’s the versatile midfielder Florian Kringe, of Borussia Dortmund. The 27-year-old was finding his playing time on the Ruhr restricted, so he’s now to Hertha for a year on loan. He has a website with fabulous pictures.

Next, there’s the striker that we so need, Columbian international Adrian Ramos. The 23-year-old has scored loads upon loads of goals at America de Cali, but of course there are question marks as to how he’ll do in a higher-level league. (And we’re losing him for the international break.)

The third newbie seemed to come out of nowhere. Brazilian midfielder Cesar (the history geek makes me giggle at us now having a Cesar and a Cicero) joins us on a free from Al Ahli. He’s 30 years old, and not quite entirely matchfit, but he was part of Lulu’s title-winning crew at FC Zürich and seems like he could possibly be a useful squad player.

Whew.

Not to mention that we’ve been drawn into our Europa League qualifying group. It could definitely have been harder. Could it have been easier? Hard to say, really- none of the other groups look like it would be better for us. Our opponents are SC Heerenveen of the Dutch league, Sporting CP of Portugal, and the Latvians FK Ventspils. Doable, certainly, if we step it up a notch from, well, now. We begin against Ventspils on September 17, in the Olympiastadion.

And Ajax is the newest club to be linked to Marko Pantelic.

My anxiety about the team was detailed pretty well on Monday; I’m still feeling that way today. The worry that I have is about goals and how to score them. We seem to have forgotten recently how to get that ball into the net. We were never a high-scoring team, preferring to rely more on defense, but we did get the job done when it needed to happen. Hopefully, back at home for the first time since that 1-0 win over Hannover, we’ll remember how it was done.

Team news is that Artur Wichniarek, who came off early into the first leg, might be back, but Lulu says he’s not yet 100%. In his place is likely to be his countryman Lukasz Piszczek, who’s been mostly deployed lately in defense. However, he did play striker earlier in his career, and desperate times call for whoever we can throw up there. Domo will have the other place up front, being the only fit striker, and the rest of the team will likely be much as what we saw at Bochum.

News is that there are still plenty of tickets left, even considering that Brøndby fans have bought up 2,000 of them.

The money from getting into the Europa League proper is probably going to play a role in our transfer fans, but beating Brøndby or not, we still need some reinforcements. Brazilian reports say that we’re negotiating for a player named Ferdandinho, who’s also a rumored target of Sporting in Portugal and Atletico Madrid. There are also apparently negotiations underway for Rwandan striker Haroun Niyonzima.

Meanwhile, BZ won’t let the dream of a certain Ukrainian die.

So make your sacrifices, knock wood, and wear your lucky clothing. We’ll need to get our luck back for tomorrow.

However, it’s becoming clear how much Hertha still needs a striker. You know that, I know that, Michael Preetz knows that. With Wichniarek unlikely to play tomorrow, our strikeforce consists of Valeri Domovchiyski. The young Bulgarian has started brightly – he scored our 1 on Thursday – but it’s still disturbingly light.

That’s most of the news for tomorrow. Domo will be expected to start up front with Raffael. Gojko Kacar and Maximillian Nicu are carrying slight knocks, but are both expected to be fine. The Swedish boy is still not quite ready, having only really trained for 10 days. Bochum will be looking for their first win of the season, having lost to Schalke and battled back for a 3-3 draw with Mönchengladbach. Hopefully, we won’t give it to them.

The other news is, of course, the Search for a Striker. Rumors swirl around Columbian international Gustavo Adrian Ramos and excellent name-haver Jan Vennegor of Hesselink, who’s a free agent after leaving Celtic. And, of course, there’s always going to be talk about Andriy Voronin, but that seems to be receding by the day as Liverpool want far more than we can afford.

For those of us in the States, the game is on GolTV tomorrow. Watch!

Hardly seems fair.

They were definitely the toughest club on offer in our portion of the draw; the other Bundesliga clubs got the unheralded names that one normally expects to see in this stage of the tournament. It does make me feel just slightly sulky, but I’ve already finished stewing. The game is on.

So. Brøndby. They’re one of the bigger teams in Danish football, with a tradition of producing good players and some noted successes in Europe. Last year they came in third in the Danish Superliga, after finishing 8th in the previous season, and were knocked out of the UEFA Cup in the first round (where we are now) by fellow Scandinavians Rosenborg. After five games of their season, they sit in seventh. They have a handful of ex-Bundesligers and Lulu says that they’re “very well organized, aggressive, and physical.”

So, that’s Brøndby. As far as we go, we’re unlikely to change the formation we’ve seen already. Drobny will play despite his broken nose. The big news before the game is that Stuttgart are apparently interested in Gojko Kacar, to which Michael Preetz says shove off (politely). As well he should- we may need money, but not enough to sell our prize possession with less than two weeks away from the end of the transfer window.

Speaking of transfers and Serbians, many have been wondering what’s up with our ex-beloved striker Marko Pantelic. If the Italian press is to be believed, he’s waiting for Roma to get bought out before moving there. They’re also claiming that he’s turned down moves to Sampdoria and Galatasaray to wait on Roma. Time is running down, but I’m sure he’ll be signed before the 31st somewhere.

Our opponent is Hannover 96, who have been in a bit of a turmoil lately. They got knocked out of the DFB-Pokal by lowly Eintracht Trier, and are struggling with injuries even this early on. (They also managed to lose a friendly to a 6th-division team.) So it’s not an ideal time to be Hannover.

Arne Friedrich says that they’re like a wounded boxer, and that’s certainly a good way to approach it. A team in Hannover’s position are going to either be completely low on confidence or angry and wanting to prove themselves. Let’s hope it’s the former, although I’m going to be expecting the latter. (Oh, pre-game pessimism, I’ve missed you.)

We’ve got the full team ready, minus the injured Fabian Lustenberger, and possibly Piszczek and Stein, who may be facing a fitness test. Wichniarek will probably get the start, with von Bergen partnering Arne in defense. Shaky at the end of last season, and with two young defenders recently signed, von Bergen has a lot to prove tomorrow if he wants to keep that place.

It’s always good to start win a win. It’s particularly important tomorrow as we’ve got two away games right after. A good start would drive us forwards in them. We have a decent starting draw, one that it’s fully possible for us to get three points from, so cross your fingers and hope we do.

One place were we didn’t get a kind draw is in this season’s Europa Cup. The draw was done today, and while all the Bundesliga clubs that finished below us got pretty easy draws (Werder Bremen with FK Aktobe of Kazakhstan and Hamburg with second-division French side EA Guingamp), we’re drawn against Brøndby IF of the Danish league. They were definitely one of the tougher teams in the draw, and it’s just our luck that we got them. Hell, last year we snuck into Europe through the Fair Play League and got a kinder selection. In his way, though, Lulu seems almost pleased with the tough draw- he says that it means the team will actually pay attention to the games. And the silver lining is that we’ve got the second leg at home.

But we can think about that later. Tomorrow, it’s all about the league.

The result, of course, was not what I wanted, and I spent quite a bit of time sulking over it. A fortuitous snow day (Seattle has been covered in snow- not a normal occurrence, and we’re all going a bit crazy) meant that I could watch a midweek game for the first time in I don’t know how long, so I got to see all but the first few minutes of Thursday’s game with Olympiakos.

It’s hard to decide what to think about it. We were on the wrong end of a 4-0 scoreline. We’re out of Europe for the year. But there are parts that were downright…positive, and I’m torn between feeling at peace about it and being still sulky, as I was after it ended.

We didn’t play terribly poorly, for the most part, and a 4-0 loss is, in my opinion, harsh. It may be karma paying us back- our last Bundesliga game of the year, after all, was a 4-0 win that was probably harsh on our opponents. In this case, though, we had a strong first half where we could have gone ahead on a few occasions. The team that came out was somewhat depleted- shorn of Gojko Kacar, Josip Simunic, and Andriy Voronin, which meant that Marko Pantelic, Steve von Bergen, and Kaka were in the starting lineup.

A word on Marko Pantelic- I would not be surprised if an announcement of his leaving is made soon after the start of January, judging by his performance on Thursday. Often this season he’s come in and immediately proved his worth, almost as if trying to show that Lulu was wrong in his judgment (or to show off to any scout that might be watching). Thursday, he just looked off and disinterested in a way I hadn’t seen. As always, I’ll be keeping you posted.

Anyway, back to that first half. It was a fast, open half of football, and we looked good- Cicero, Raffael, and Maximilian Nicu all came close to opening the scoring, and as it wound down I felt like we had a good chance of nicking something from the game.

The second half, though, Olympiakos came on strong and it was only a few minutes after the break that Drobny was called upon to make a nice save. A few minutes after that Hertha fell asleep at a set piece and an unmarked Dudu headed in a free-kick. 1-0 to the home side. We tried to come back into it, but on the 64th minute poor Steve von Bergen gave away yet another penalty, which was duly converted. 2-0 to the home side. von Bergen’s been sadly disappointing this season- I actually do like him, but it seems that he’s never got his head straight after missing the Euros this summer through injury.

After that, we really did lose it a bit. We’d looked pretty good up to that point, but after the penalty we never looked like scoring. Either we got tired (we’ve played a lot of games, what with all the qualifiers), or our heads just went down after we were 2-0 down. We’d have had to score 3 goals at that point to go through, and we hadn’t taken our chances up to that point, so…well. The final two goals came on the 86th and 89th minutes, well and truly killing our chances, but the game was done before that. 4-0 was a harsh scoreline, but in the situation, I could see how it happened.

But it’s not all negatives. The first half, as said, was very nice, and with better finishing during that 45 minutes, the story could have been a lot different. It was also more minutes for a recovering Amine Chermiti. Those who’ve been following the blog here know that Rami over at Tunisia World Cup Blog has got me excited about the kid, and I can’t wait to see what he does in the second half of the season.

The big story, though, to the point where it almost overshadowed the result, was the return of Lúcio. The Brazilian midfielder started so well last season before suffering a horrible knee injury in September of 2007. It’s been a long, long recovery, over a year, but on the 87th minute he made his re-entry onto the field. He’s back. The winter break and training camp (and whatever friendlies get played) should see more of him, and, just as with Chermiti, I can’t wait to see him in the second half of the season. Welcome back, we’re all happy to see you. It also means he’s cut his hair, after 15 months.

So that’s Olympiakos, and that’s the UEFA Cup. It’s sad to be out, but we’ve got some good memories, and at least we didn’t finish bottom- that position was reserved for Benfica. Hopefully, we’ll see Europe next year, and perhaps we’ll be in a better position for it.

In other news, Arne Friedrich has officially signed a new contract. The new deal takes him to the 2012 season, with a one-year automatic renewal if he plays at least 25 games in that season. What’s interesting is that apparently, Arne took a pay cut in his new contract, rather than the rumored pay raise. His new deal is supposed to be at €3 million a year, but at the beginning of the discussion he was apparently demanding four. Something happened to bring it down. I’m not sure what, but I’m glad. And I’m very glad to be keeping Arne.

Our season has been defined by two things- a good defense and astute signings. The thing is, the two haven’t really met. Our inspiring signings, like Maximilian Nicu and Cicero, have been offensive. Our defense, on the other hand, has been based on players that predate Lulu (excepting magical goalkeeper and Herthaner of the Hinrunde Jaroslav Drobny). The attempts to sign new defenders, like von Bergen and Kaka, haven’t worked out nearly as well as what we have. So until our defensive scouting gets sorted out, keeping the defenders that have got us to the place we are is worthwhile.

Speaking of new attackers, the other Hertha news making the rounds is that Voronin wants to stay. I don’t mind keeping him, especially since if Pante leaves we’ll be seriously deficient in the Eastern Europeans with dodgy ponytails category. My only question is his price tag- I’m not sure the kind of wages (and transfer fee from Liverpool) he’ll command is best spent on him. (Maybe on Gojko Kacar’s possible salary demands.)

So that’s the story. The best Hinrunde we’ve ever had is over. We may be out of Europe, but we’ve got a whole other half of a season to make sure we get a chance again.