"Players who will wear our colours with pride"

61 days of talking, negotiating and completing contracts officially came to an end on Tuesday evening at 6pm. With the transfer window closed, Hertha fans finally have a clearer idea of how their team will be setting up this season. "We are very pleased with our transfers. We have done exactly what we set out to do and found players who will wear enjoy wearing our jersey and do so with pride. These lads want to show their passion on the pitch and want to improve – that was our aim," said managing director for sport, Fredi Bobic, during Thursday’s talk with the press. Herthabsc.com listened in for more quotes on the start of the season, new signings and head coach Pál Dárdai. Fredi Bobic on…

…the start of the season: We’re not happy in the slightest with our return so far, that much is clear. Starting with 0 points is difficult to excuse. We’ve been hard on ourselves in the last few days to try and identify what we need to improve on. We need to highlight the positives and keep working on them, while putting a stop to the bad things. This has been analysed calmly with the coaching team. Now we will be making sure we are well-equipped to take on the next few games after the international break. Zero points after three games is not quite a crisis, but it is a really bad start, that has to be said. We expected a lot more and now it’s up to us to put things right.  

…his transfer record: We are very pleased with our transfers. We did exactly what we set out to do and signed players that will enjoy wearing our jersey and do so with pride. These lads want to show their passion on the pitch and improve themselves. That was our aim. We also let players go whose hearts weren’t quite in it as much anymore, who had completely other intentions and who didn’t want to continue working on our process. A lot of people thing that lots of big things happen on the last day of the window, but there weren’t many surprises on Deadline Day. This day has been pushed by the media in recent years. We carried out our plans quite quickly and were all in agreement that not much would happen on the final day. I am happy with how we have worked so far, including our Deadline Day deals and the fact that we have fought hard for every transfer, whether it was ingoing or outgoing. We want to change the face of Hertha BSC with youthfulness and with lads who show potential. It is our job to acquire players that will wear the Hertha shirt with pride. That’s what our fans want to see as well.

…changes in the squad: We definitely have more perspectives now, that’s important. We need to move away from the mindset that we need big names in the squad. We had big names here for two years, but they were two years of chaos. Just because I’m at Hertha now does not mean that I can click my fingers and improve things every day. True change involves a transformation. This transformation is not possible in the space of one or two months, however, it’s a long process, which we are working on. We want to think sustainably and that is a big challenge for us. It’s really important that we work hard. I want to see players whose heart is in what they do on the pitch, players who wear the club colours with provide and who believe in our cause.

…Hertha’s public image in recent days: It’s been a bumpy ride so far and we could have made things easier for ourselves. We are to blame for some of the negative headlines. I’ll gladly take full responsibility for the ‘transfers loading’ graphic, this didn’t paint the best image of us and I can’t blame the fans or the press in any way here for seeing things negatively. I can see why this would suggest that something bigger is on its way. It wasn’t our intention to be misleading in any way and I can only apologise to the fans.

... the squad’s new mentality: This is such an important aspect nowadays. Italy didn’t win this summer’s European Championship just by having the best eleven players on the pitch, but by having the strongest mentality and by working together as a team. This is also vital for us: we have to work together, and our head coach and director of sport also know that – we are all agreed that’s exactly what we want to see on the pitch. We want to be a team that sticks with each other through thick and thin and who are all fighters. We were looking for players with these qualities in the transfer market. All of our boys are fantastic players: of course you could say that we have let some players go who have helped us achieve our targets, but these players wanted more money, to play in the Champions League or just didn’t want to play for us anymore, and this attitude meant that the team has had significant issues in the last two years. Individually, they are good players and big names, but they are not devoted to the team, and that is the most important thing for me.

... the winger situation: In Myziane Maolida we have signed a very, very exciting winger who embodies the values of our club. Myziane is a very quick player with a lot of potential, and we have to help him improve and live up to it so that we can look back on the transfer as a good move, but I’m in no way expecting the youngster to become a superstar overnight. We have also signed Marco Richter who is also capable of playing on the wing, so we have several options in this position. We did contact other players of greater stature, but due to wage or transfer sum issues this was not possible. We were successful in that we acted diligently in the market so as not to take any major risks, because we are aware of situation regarding the pandemic and we wanted to ensure the sustainability of the club over anything.

...Pál Dárdai’s remarks: I was surprised and not overly pleased with his comments. Pál and I had a long conversation about it and cleared the air. I made it explicitly clear to him that this was exclusively about Hertha BSC and not about individuals. We need to all be in this together and we don’t need hurdles such as these. It was an emotional outburst from Pál – it’s good to see emotion, but preferably on the pitch. We shouldn’t be hearing of these kinds of comments. We tried to express our thoughts to each other clearly, but I do find that quite difficult. It was anomalous behaviour from our head coach, and we are convinced that he is the right man to lead our team.