Hamburg’s Merlin Polzin reflects on showdown with ‘brutal bogey team’ Bayern Munich | OneFootball

Newly promoted Hamburg square off against German giants Bayern Munich in this coming Saturday evening’s Bundesliga “Top-Spiel” at the Allianz Arena. The question as to which team counts as favorites on paper isn’t even a close one. For the struggling Hamburger SV, historical headwinds aren’t exactly kind either.

The last ten times Hamburg have squared off against Bayern in the German top flight, the German record champions have won by a combined 38-3 scoreline. In the last eight matches in Munich, Bayern retain a 50-3 aggregate advantage.

Hamburg haven’t scored a goal in their last four top flight fixtures against Bayern. Hamburg last beat Bayern in September 2009. HSV haven’t won at the Allianz since March of 2006. Bayern have ruthlessly demolished the Hanseatic city state club a ridiculous amount of times in recent years.

There was an 8-0 thrashing in February 2015, a 5-0 shellacking in August of the same calendar year, another 8-0 slaughter in February 2017, and – the last time Hamburg was in the Bundesliga – a 6-0 drubbing in March of 2018.

This totally lopsided set of fixtures all began with Bayern’s 9-2 beatdown of Thorsten Fink’s HSV at the Allianz on March 30th, 2013. Hamburg famously invited club supporters to a free outdoor barbecue at the Volksparkstadion outdoors as a means of making amends.

Current HSV head coach Merlin Polzin was a 22-year-old assistant coach at the club’s youth academy at the time. Journalists attending the now 34-year-old’s Thursday pre-match press conference couldn’t help asking Polzin about the legendary defeat.

“I was at the stadium that day, but didn’t participate in the barbecue,” Polzin said. “A lot of goals went in that day. There’s been very little joy for us recently when it comes to this matchup. That’s why it’s an excellent idea to not busy ourselves with the past and talk about configuring a new future.

“I don’t think I have to give the HSV fans encouragement,” Polzin answered when confronted directly with the horrible slate of results. “We can’t influence what happened in the past. That’s outside my realm of influence. It’s all about preparing for this game.

“I’m looking forward to hearing some loud HSV fans,” Polzin continued. “We have great traveling support. They came out to see us [on matchday one] away at Borussia Mönchengladbach. The atmosphere before the game, during, and after the game was unbelievable.“

“They [the traveling supporters] will be loud and we will leave everything on the pitch,” Polzin concluded.

GGFN | Peter Weis