Ex-HSV keeper Raab: Promotion season was mentally a disaster | OneFootball

Matheo Raab was part of Hamburg’s promotion squad. However, he struggled with his own role, which could have been much more prominent.

Ultimately, the goalkeeper played only three league matches. He found himself in the backup role behind Daniel Heuer Fernandes, which was originally intended for him after his signing in the summer of 2022. “I then had the opportunity to develop further at such a big club like HSV and to sign a long-term contract. I didn’t want to miss out on this chance,” said Matheo Raab about his decision in an interview with Mopo.

He had to wait a year and a half for his chance, before Tim Walter, shortly before his dismissal, took Heuer Fernandes—who was not performing at his best at the time—out of goal. The 26-year-old had planned for this waiting game: “I’ve never been handed anything on a silver platter when changing clubs, and I was never the number one right away. I’ve always worked for everything. That’s what I managed to do at HSV as well.”

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HSV: Raab Almost Became First-Choice Goalkeeper

In fact, Walter’s successor Steffen Baumgart also stuck with Raab and wanted to go into the 2024/25 season with him as the number one. However, during pre-season, the keeper suffered from pneumonia, which forced Heuer Fernandes back between the posts. “That was brutal. I had just made my breakthrough. The new season was about to start. I was number one and had earned the coach’s trust. I finally wanted to build something together with the team from the beginning. Then I was out for six weeks—and it was clear that I couldn’t immediately expect to play again right away,” Raab recalled.

He did step in again when Heuer Fernandes was briefly sidelined. But even a brilliant performance in the 3-0 win in Düsseldorf didn’t make Baumgart change his mind again. To make matters worse, Raab broke his hand at the end of the first half of the season and only returned to the squad at the end of April. He watched the final sprint—and thus the promotion, sealed on May 10th by a 6-1 win over Ulm—from the bench.

Photo: IMAGO

Despite the greatest success of his career, Raab doesn’t look back too positively on the past season: “Mentally, last year was a disaster for me personally.” Although the promotion somewhat softened his disappointment, personally it was “still not a good year.” A change of scenery therefore seems only logical. Raab joined Union Berlin in the summer, where he met Baumgart again, but is also serving as a backup goalkeeper there.

Photo: Getty Images

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇩🇪 here.