Hoffenheim's revival meets rising unrest - Where things stand in Sinsheim at the break | OneFootball

Hoffenheim are operating in an entirely different stratosphere when compared to last season. 

Die Kraichgauer are well within the hunt for a European position after their 2024/25 slump, and are firing on all cylinders under Christian Ilzer. 

Away from the pitch, the ongoings aren't the easiest. But on it, they have massively turned a corner.

Big home win caps off an excellent run

It could potentially be deemed harsh to put too much emphasis on Hoffenheim's home form during the early days of the season, given that their three consecutive losses in Sinsheim came against Eintracht Frankfurt, Bayern Munich, and a promoted Köln side out with a point to prove. 

Though when our future selves look back on the season historically, the simple fact of the matter is that the club had begun the season without a home win until October, while the record itself stretched back to April. 

Then came the final days of October. Following an emphatic 3-0 victory on the road against St. Pauli, Die Sinsheimer would welcome fellow Baden-Württembergers Heidenheim to the PreZero Arena. Naturally, they carried the title of favourites, but they still had to do the job. 

And that they did, with goals from the electric Fisnik Asllani, Tim Lemperle and Andrej Kramaric sealing a 3-1 win - TSG's first home win of the campaign. 

And much like London buses, you wait long enough for one, and two come along at once. Following a 3-2 away win against Wolfsburg, Hoffenheim would overcome high-flying RB Leipzig in Sinsheim. 

Albian Hajdari, the aforementioned Lemperle and the recently returning Grischa Prömel would complete the comeback to secure another 3-1 win, meaning that lightning did indeed strike twice in the Kraichgau region. 

Heading into the pause for internationals, Ilzer's side sat sixth, before they take part in the matchweek 11 curtain-raiser away at Mainz on Friday evening - another match in which they will fancy themselves to take three points. 

The Wittmann saga and growing unrest

With the club flying high on the pitch, Hoffenheim find themselves dealing with one of the most destabilising internal disputes they have faced in years, away from it.

Long-running tensions surrounding controversial agent and long-time Dietmar Hopp associate Roger Wittmann have escalated sharply in recent weeks, fuelled by a court ruling, high-profile departures, and a renewed wave of supporter anger.

In September, the regional court in Heidelberg overturned the club-issued stadium ban against Wittmann, concluding that the verbal confrontation he was involved in did not constitute a sufficient legal basis to exclude him from public matches.

However, Hoffenheim’s separate ban preventing Wittmann from entering the club’s training ground remains in place - a restriction the court deemed permissible as an internal measure.

The reaction among supporters has been fierce. Wittmann is widely regarded as an unpopular figure within the fanbase, with many fearing he has accumulated an outsized degree of informal influence at the club due to his closeness to Hopp. Some believe this influence has shaped internal decision-making over several years, contributing to a sense of imbalance behind the scenes.

The situation escalated further following the departures of two senior executives - Dr Markus Schütz and Frank Briel - shortly after the court ruling. 

While officially described as mutual, German media reports linked the exits to internal tensions in which Wittmann played a significant role. For many fans, the timing only reinforced concerns that the club’s internal power structure was shifting in an unhealthy direction, despite Hopp having returned Hoffenheim’s voting rights to the membership in 2023 to comply fully with 50+1.

The playing staff can’t let protests derail excellent form

The response inside the PreZero Arena has underlined just how serious the mood has become - and how central supporter protest is within German football culture.

Ahead of the win over Leipzig, Hoffenheim’s ultras staged one of their most coordinated demonstrations in years. Banners were unveiled portraying Wittmann as a destabilising force, while chants of “Wittmann stoppen” echoed throughout the match. A prominent banner in the Südkurve delivered the bluntest message: “Roger Wittmann, verpiss dich aus unserem Verein" (Get the hell out of our club).

Wittmann, through his lawyers, has responded to the protests, with one of his attorneys, Dominik Höch, promising “legal action," via Kicker, due to Öffentlichkeitsfahndung posters (public manhunt). 

Höch told Kicker that the banner qualifies as “criminal speech”, with the text coming across as “serious” and “not a play on words.”

“That was a deliberately hurtful sign that significantly violates our client's personal rights,” Höch told Kicker. “It is also completely incomprehensible that the club did not sufficiently oppose the distribution of the ‘wanted posters’ around and inside the stadium and did not protect the rights of a very good business partner.”

For a club producing its strongest football in several seasons, the contrast could scarcely be sharper. Hoffenheim’s on-pitch resurgence sits alongside an increasingly fraught political landscape off it - and the dispute shows no sign of easing any time soon.

The challenge for Ilzer’s players is to ensure the noise away from the pitch does not seep onto it. If they can shield themselves from the storm, their excellent form suggests the upward trajectory can continue long after the international break.