“Felt like a waste of time”: ex-pro reflects on HSV spell | OneFootball

He never quite made the final breakthrough at HSV, but at SV Elversberg he has now become one of the team’s most important players.

Former Hamburg player Lukasz Poreba has now spoken openly about his time at the Volkspark in an interview with the Polish portal Weszlo, using some rather remarkable words. “I was angry, I won’t deny that,” the midfielder admits in retrospect.

The 2024/25 season frustrated him in particular. After suffering an injury in the summer, Poreba lost his place, even though he felt he had been performing well. He especially remembers the weeks around Steffen Baumgart’s dismissal. “The coach said he would go back to the old team, even though he was happy with me. I was really angry,” the Pole reports.

After Baumgart’s departure and Merlin Polzin’s appointment, a difficult spell followed with very little playing time. He had already wanted to leave the club in winter, but was not given permission to do so. “Despite everything, I remember that time positively, even if in some ways it may have seemed like a waste of time,” said the 26-year-old. At the same time, he stresses: “I always gave everything. Now I’m reaping the rewards.”

Photo: Getty Images

Poreba blossomed after leaving HSV

What Poreba means by that is this: at Elversberg, he has a completely different role. In the promotion season of 2025/26 alone, he played all 34 league matches and was in the starting lineup 32 times. And his importance has not changed in the Bundesliga either. In the first four matches of the season, he played the full 90 minutes each time and played a major part in SVE making an excellent start with four points.

More than that: in Saarland, Poreba is now regarded as something of a quiet leader. Coach Vincent Wagner recently summed up his importance perfectly in comments to the Saarbrücker Zeitung: “Lukasz speaks with his feet.”

For Poreba, all of this now seems to be paying off — the very things he held on to even during difficult times at HSV. “I knew I would make it at some point — in Hamburg or somewhere else,” he says today. In Elversberg, he has long since done exactly that.

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