Bundesliga’s big boys in crisis: Tables turn on Hamburg, Schalke and Werder Bremen

At the top of the table everybody knows the modern routine – the Bayern Munich juggernaut can survive changes of manager and inevitably rules the roost, writes Ian Hawkey.

Hamburg manager Markus Gisdol, left, is trying to work out with his assistants how to fight an air of despondency at the club who are bottom of the table. Getty Images

The Bundesliga is upside down. Well, at least part of it is.

At the top of the table everybody knows the modern routine – the Bayern Munich juggernaut can survive changes of manager and inevitably rules the roost.

And that Borussia Dortmund should make the most sustained pursuit.

But these days you tend to locate the other so-called heavyweights at the foot of the league, where you could open a hostel for sleeping giants.

Two of the three trapdoor positions – those that lead either to automatic relegation or to the tense play-off against a team from the second-tier that is the plight of the team finishing 16th in the 18-club top flight – are occupied by institutions who can festoon their hallways with trophies accumulated in glorious histories.

Rock-bottom Hamburg were in a European Cup final recently enough that supporters in their 40s can recall it.

Schalke, two off the foot, were in an Uefa Champions League semi-final only five years back.

Werder Bremen, who with Schalke have more major titles on their honours board than any club other than Bayern and Dortmund, could fall into the bottom three following Saturday’s action.

Bremen are now becoming known as just another “dinosaur”, a term regularly used of Hamburg in recent times, and a species whose population seems to be increasing.

If the hierarchy of the table were dictated by supporter-numbers, Hamburg and Schalke would be in the top four and looking forward to Champions League football every year.

As it is, the more than 100,000 who consistently attend home games at those two clubs – both average more than 50,000 – the past two months have been dismal.

Slumps are becoming routine for Hamburg, where relegation has been narrowly avoided three of the past five years, twice it has only by the play-off route.

It is groundhog day at Hamburg.

They have another new coach, having terminated Bruno Labbadia’s second stab at the job at the end of last month, with one point gained from their first six matches of the new campaign.

Labbadia’s replacement, Markus Gisdol, has found an air of despondency about the place but declared ahead of Saturday’s trip to Borussia Monchengladbach: “If I caught the mood at the moment it would bring us down. We have to say: ‘Let’s stop this’!”

Hamburg’s loyalists have heard similar noises before.

Seven coaches have come and gone in the six years between Labbadia’s first stint ending and his latest dismissal.

Schalke are only two points better off than Hamburg.

Bremen, who have four points, also have changed their manager already this term.

All of these struggling, so-called heavyweights look up the table and see the likes of Red Bull Leipzig and Bayer Leverkusen in the positions that lead to European football.

Hoffenheim, the club from a place with a population of less than 4,000, sit just behind that pair in seventh spot.

That trio are caustically referred to as “plastic clubs” by their rivals, clubs whose majority stakes are in the hands of wealthy individuals or corporations – Red Bull in the case of newly-promoted Leipzig; the pharmaceutical giant, Bayer, for Leverkusen – and have much smaller support-bases than the so-called “dinosaurs”.

Most German clubs are obliged to keep the dominant shareholding in the hands of club members, but the rules were relaxed in the cases of Leverkusen and Volkswagen-owned Wolfsburg, the 2009 Bundesliga champions.

Leipzig have interpreted the system rather flexibly and soared up the divisions with the financial backing of the soft-drink manufacturer.

Leipzig, in particular, are loudly resented for the money that has given them wings.

But in Hamburg and Bremen, and in Schalke’s hometown of Gelsenkirchen, they are feared, and a little envied, for their upstart energy.

Player of the week – Inaki Williams

Ahead of the Spanish Primera Liga’s first Basque derby of the season, Athletic Bilbao against Real Sociedad on Sunday, one of Spanish football’s brightest young prospects is looking to recover his edge on front of goal.

Quick heels

Williams has shot to prominence over the last 22 months, to become something of an icon for Athletic Bilbao since he made his debut in the Spanish top flight in December 2014. He scores spectacular goals, and he is quick. Last season he was timed covering ground at over 35 kph, faster than any other Primera Liga player.

History maker

He is also the first black player ever to have scored for Athletic, a club who follow a tradition of only selecting footballers with a Basque background, either by birth or ancestry or upbringing. Williams was born in the region, to Ghanaian and Liberian parents who met in Ghana and emigrated to Spain. They gave their oldest son a very Basque name, Inaki.

International suitors

Those unusual roots make Williams conspicuous, and, alas, he was subjected to racist abuse from some fans of Sporting Gijon earlier this season. His background means he has been the subject of interest from three different countries, with an eye on his international career. He could have represented Liberia; Ghana made enquiries about him but earlier this year he won his first senior cap for Spain, having represented their under-21s, and was named as a back-up for Spain’s Euro 2016 squad.

Second year syndrome

Williams passed the milestone of 50 Primera Liga matches last month, and signed a new contract in January, but his form has plateaued somewhat since the outset of this campaign. He is yet to open his goalscoring account in 2016-17. Opponents have become wise to his strengths, wary of his bursts of pace from a position on the right of the attack.

Derby demons

Williams, 22, hit 13 goals last season, and responds well to the big occasion: he struck a goal in the 2015 Copa del Rey final against Barcelona and registered against the same opponents in a Cup quarter-final earlier this year. But in the derby against Sociedad he is yet to score. The fixture has a bad memory, too: he was injured in the 1-0 defeat against Sociedad in February, and missed a month and half recovering.

Coveted

Williams has a buyout clause of €50 million (Dh202.4m) in his current contract, which runs until 2021. The sum is a precaution, notably because of predatory interest from English Premier League clubs. One day Athletic may profit extensively from their speedy, powerful, pathfinder of a striker, though for now they will pleased to see him recover his best form in the local rivalry that matters most to many of their supporters.

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