By John Bagratuni, dpa
Berlin (dpa) – All the misery of the past months would have been forgotten had they won the derby but instead Schalke’s woes are even bigger now following a 3-0 meltdown against arch-rivals Borussia Dortmund.
Schalke famously fought back from four goals down to 4-4 in Dortmund in 2017, and won 4-2 there in 2019 but this time around they didn’t even come remotely close.
The Bild paper spoke of “the most unequal derby of all time” and the Bundesliga website said that Schalke had a mere 30 per cent possession and registered no shot on target during the 90 minutes.
The proud club are now winless in 21 Bundesliga matches over more than 10 months, with only Tasmania Berlin worse in league history having gone 31 games in a row without success in 1965-66.
“We were really, really poor on the whole,” midfielder Bastian Oczipka admitted.
Coach Manuel Baum said “we don’t have enough confidence at the moment. We need to get into the habit of wanting to score goals. We can’t just look to do a good job at the back.”
The Sueddeutsche Zeitung (SZ) on Sunday named January 9 the day when Schalke could match Tasmania if they continue failing to win.
Schalke’s downfall has been quite spectacular and hurts their devoted fan base. UEFA Cup winners in 1997 and Champions League semi-finalist in 2011, they were seconds away from a first-ever Bundesliga title in 2001 and runners-up the last time in 2018.
The club still cultivates its mining heritage but with coal-mining long over in this former industrial heartland the work ethics of the team has been questioned lately.
Broadcasters Sport1 last week quoted Schalke ultra fans as threatening the players after a 1-1 draw against Union Berlin that if the team didn’t present itself in the same way Dortmund “then we will meet again and it won’t be as peaceful.”
The SZ named Schalke’s attitude in the first half the only positive aspect in Dortmund who won from second-half goals by Manuel Akanji, Erling Haaland and Mats Hummels.
In the area of footballing skill the SZ said Schalke played according to their second-last position in the table with just one points from five games – with only Mainz worse on zero points.
How to create a turnaround remains a mystery as a financial crisis only worsening amid the coronavirus pandemic doesn’t allow them any major activities on the transfer market.
Long gone are the days that Marc Wilmots, Klaas-Jan Huntelaar or Raul Gonzalez wore the royal blue shirt.
Instead, 19-year-old Malick Thiaw made his debut in the starting 11 while 20-year-old Kilian Ludewig played only his second top flight game.
Injuries concerning the likes of Suat Serdar and Mark Uth have hurt the club, just as a tough opening programme with the first three away matches at the top three from last season, treble winners Bayern Munich, RB Leipzig and Dortmund.
Starting with an 8-0 humiliation in Munich they shipped 15 goals in those three games, without scoring themselves.
Seven-time national champions Schalke have recovered from a match-fixing scandal in the early 1970s, and five seasons in the second division between 1981 and 1991 but some sort of turnaround is needed to avoid another drop they only avoided last season because of a strong first half of the campaign.
But Baum, who arrived last month in succession of David Wagner, remains stubbornly optimistic ahead of the next match Friday against VfB Stuttgart.
“I’m optimistic that things can improve quite quickly. We need some success to get back on track though,” Baum said.
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