TSG 1899 Hoffenheim


Turn- und Sportgemeinschaft 1899 Hoffenheim e.V., or simply TSG 1899 Hoffenheim is a professional German association football club based in Hoffenheim, a village of Sinsheim municipality, Baden-Württemberg.
Originally founded in 1899 as a gymnastics club, Hoffenheim came into being in its modern form in 1945. A fifth division side in 2000, the club rapidly advanced through the German football league system with the financial backing of alumnus and software mogul Dietmar Hopp, and in 2008 Hoffenheim was promoted to the top tier Bundesliga. In the 2017–18 season, Hoffenheim finished third in the Bundesliga, qualifying for the UEFA Champions League group stage for the first time.
Since 2009, Hoffenheim has played its home games at the Rhein-Neckar-Arena, having previously played at the Dietmar-Hopp-Stadion from 1999.

History

The modern-day club was formed in 1945, when gymnastics club Turnverein Hoffenheim and football club Fußballverein Hoffenheim merged. At the beginning of the 1990s, the club was an obscure local amateur side playing in the eighth division Baden-Württemberg A-Liga. They steadily improved and by 1996 were competing in the Verbandsliga Nordbaden.
Around 2000, alumnus Dietmar Hopp returned to the club of his youth as a financial backer. Hopp was the co-founder of software firm SAP and he put some of his money into the club. His contributions generated almost immediate results: in 2000 Hoffenheim finished first in the Verbandsliga and was promoted to the fourth-division Oberliga Baden-Württemberg. Another first-place finish moved the club up to the Regionalliga Süd for the 2001–02 season. They finished 13th in their first season in the Regionalliga, but improved significantly the next year, earning a fifth-place result.
Hoffenheim earned fifth and seventh-place finishes in the next two seasons, before improving to fourth in 2005–06 to earn their best result to date. The club made its first DFB-Pokal appearance in the 2003–04 competition and performed well, advancing to the quarter-finals by eliminating 2. Bundesliga sides Eintracht Trier and Karlsruher SC and Bundesliga club Bayer Leverkusen before being put out themselves by another 2. Bundesliga side, VfB Lübeck.
Negotiations to merge TSG Hoffenheim, Astoria Walldorf, and SV Sandhausen to create FC Heidelberg 06 in 2005 were abandoned due to the resistance of the latter two clubs, and the failure to agree on whether the new side's stadium should be located in Heidelberg or Eppelheim. Team owner Hopp clearly preferred Heidelberg, but could not overcome the resistance of local firm Wild, which had already reserved the site of the planned stadium for its new production facilities.

2006–2008: Major investments, promotion to the Bundesliga

In 2006, the club sought to improve its squad and technical staff by bringing in players with several years of Bundesliga experience, most notably Jochen Seitz and Tomislav Marić, and young talents like Sejad Salihović, while signing manager Ralf Rangnick, who managed Bundesliga teams such as SSV Ulm 1846, VfB Stuttgart, Hannover 96 and Schalke 04, to a five-year contract. The investment paid off in the 2006–07 season with the club's promotion to the 2. Bundesliga after finishing second in Regionalliga Süd.
The 2007–08 season was Hoffenheim's first season in professional football. After a weak start with three losses and only one draw in the first four games, the team's performance improved remarkably and Hoffenheim climbed from 16th place on matchday four to second place on matchday 23. The team managed to defend their place until the end of the season, having scored 60 points after matchday 34. As a result of their second-place finish they received automatic promotion to the Bundesliga, the highest tier in German football, after just playing in the 2. Bundesliga for one season.

2008–present: Growth of the club and Champions League football

Hoffenheim had a successful season in their debut in the Bundesliga, the top German division, as they went on to record a 7th place finish. The club's best players of the season were Vedad Ibišević and Demba Ba, who scored 18 and 14 respectively. In the 2009–10 Bundesliga, the club had a less successful season, recording a finish outside of the top 10, finishing 11th. The club eventually went on to finish in 11th place for the next two consecutive seasons. In the 2012–13 Bundesliga, the club came very close to suffering relegation, after they a 16th place finish, meaning they would have to play in the relegation play-offs to survive; the club went on to beat their opponents Kaiserslautern by a scoreline of 5–2 on aggregate, with their talent Roberto Firmino scoring two goals in the first match. In the 2013–14 Bundesliga, the club had a very strange statistics; being the third best goalscoring team in the league, but also the worst defensive team, scoring 72 goals and conceding 70. The club's best goalscorer of the season, also their best assist provider, was Roberto Firmino, scoring 16 goals and providing 12 assists, with the player winning the Bundesliga Breakthrough Player of the Season award. In the 2014–15 Bundesliga, the club came very close to qualifying for the Europa League, with just two points separating them from Borussia Dortmund, who were in 7th place, despite the 8th place finish, Hoffenheim still had a goal difference of −6 in the 2014–15 season. In the 2015–16 Bundesliga, the club once again came close to suffering relegation, with just one point separating them from the relegation play-offs.
In the 2016–17 season, new coach Julian Nagelsmann took over, beginning to recruit several very significant players, including Andrej Kramarić, Kerem Demirbay and Sandro Wagner. Initially into the season, the club was in a struggling form, with four draws in the first four games of the season, before a rise in form rose the club to third place in the league by the end of October. On 4 April 2017, the club beat Bayern Munich by a scoreline of 1–0, one of the most important wins in the club's history. On 21 April 2017, the club confirmed that they would play European football next season following a 1–1 draw with Köln. Following a 4th place finish in the 2016–17 Bundesliga, Hoffenheim confirmed Champions League football for the 2017–18 season. The club were eventually drawn to play six-time European champions Liverpool in the play-off round. The club lost the first leg tie by a scoreline of 1–2, before a 4–2 loss in the second leg confirmed Hoffenheim's elimination from the tournament, as the club lost 3–6 on aggregate. Due to their elimination from the play-off stages, the club would continue playing European football in the Europa League group stages, however, the club would suffer elimination from the tournament as they would finish bottom of their group.
In the 2017–18 Bundesliga season, Hoffenheim had a successful season, finishing third, automatically qualifying for next year's UEFA Champions League.
The 2018–19 season was more disappointing for Hoffenheim, as they finished bottom of their Champions League group with only 3 draws and 3 losses whilst playing against the likes of Manchester City, Lyon and Shakhtar Donetsk. This meant that they did not make it out of the group stages of a European competition again. In the Bundesliga Hoffenheim didn't fare much better, finishing a disappointing 9th place, 6 below their ranking of 3rd during the 2017–18 campaign with 51 points. This was just two places and 3 points away from the Europa League qualifying rounds. In the DFB-Pokal Hoffenheim were eliminated by RB Leipzig in a 2–0 loss with both goals from Timo Werner. The seasons top scorer was Andre Kramarić, with the Croatian finding the goal 22 times in 37 appearances. The German Kerem Demirbay was the clubs top playmaker with 11 assists during the 2018–19 season. Head coach Julian Nagelsmann left the club to join RB Leipzig at the end of the season. Alfred Schreuder, former assistant coach under Huub Stevens and Julian Nagelsmann was appointed as the new head coach.

Players

Current squad

Players out on loan

Reserve team

Women's team

Staff

First team

Stadium

Before being promoted to the 1. Bundesliga in 2008, the club played in Dietmar-Hopp-Stadion which was built in 1999 with a capacity of 5,000.
TSG 1899 Hoffenheim made their loftier ambitions clear in 2006 when the club's management decided to build the new 30,150 seat Rhein-Neckar-Arena suitable for hosting Bundesliga matches. The stadium was originally to be built in Heidelberg before the selection of a site in Sinsheim.
They opened their first season in the 1. Bundesliga at the 26,022 capacity Carl-Benz-Stadion in Mannheim and played their first match in their new stadium on 31 January 2009.
Interwetten betting company has agreed to be the stadium's betting partner for TSG Hoffenheim from August 2017, to 2020.

Controversy

Criticism of the club

Dietmar Hopp's financial support, which transformed Hoffenheim from a local amateur club into a competitive Bundesliga club, has been strongly criticized by other clubs, fans and some in the German press. The main points of criticism are the club's lack of "tradition" and a proper fan base as the club is a historically insignificant side from a village of just 3,300 inhabitants. This situation is similar to that of now-defunct Scottish side Gretna and German clubs VfL Wolfsburg, Bayer Leverkusen and RB Leipzig, as those teams also received large financial support by companies; Wolfsburg is wholly owned and supported by automobile manufacturer Volkswagen, Bayer Leverkusen by pharmaceutical company Bayer and RB Leipzig by Red Bull. Despite this, Leverkusen and Wolfsburg are nonetheless different from Hoffenheim because of their long history as football clubs founded by the factory workers themselves, and have been successful chiefly through their own merits rather than outside funding.
On 16 August 2011, the club released a statement regarding complaints of a loudspeaker that was strategically placed under away fans during a home game against Borussia Dortmund. The loudspeaker was designed to drown out the noise of the away fans cheers and chants during the game. It is reported that the speaker was placed by the groundskeeper and the club denies any involvement saying he acted alone. It is also reported that the loudspeaker was used during other games not just the home game against Dortmund.
In a later statement, the club admitted that the disruptive sound assembly has been used at least five times, although club officials claim to have no knowledge of these measures.
On 29 February 2020, Bayern Munich supporters unfurled an offensive banner aimed at Hoffenheim owner Dietmar Hopp, resulting the game at Hoffenheim to be suspended with less than 15 minutes remaining. After concerns that the game could be abandoned, both teams returned to finish the match, but had decided to just run down the clock to end the game in solidarity with Hopp. Rather than play on, the two sets of players began passing the ball to each other and chatting as if they were teammates.
The very next day, the Bundesliga match between Vfl Wolfsburg and 1. FC Union Berlin was stopped at the 44th minute of play due to derogatory banners being unfurled, one of which showed Hopp under crosshairs. The two teams left the field to return 10 minutes later and play out the remainder of the half and subsequently the game.

Honours

The club's honours:

League

Cup

Recent coaches of the club:
StartEndCoach
19791982 Helmut Zuber
19821982 Meinard Stadelbauer
19821984 Rudi Ebel
19841985 Klaus Keller
19861989 Helmut Jedele
19891990 Gerhard Boll
19901992 Egon Ludwig
19921994 Hans Schreiner
19941998 Roland Schmitt
19981998 Alfred Schön
199814 March 1999 Raimund Lietzau
15 March 199930 September 1999 Günter Hillenbrand
31 August 199912 March 2000 Riko Weigand
200030 June 2000 Alfred Schön
1 July 200019 November 2005 Hans-Dieter Flick
19 November 200523 December 2005 Roland Dickgießer*
10 January 200621 May 2006 Lorenz-Günther Köstner
24 May 200630 June 2006 Alfred Schön*
1 July 20061 January 2011 Ralf Rangnick
2 January 201130 June 2011 Marco Pezzaiuoli
1 July 20119 February 2012 Holger Stanislawski
10 February 20123 December 2012 Markus Babbel
3 December 201231 December 2012 Frank Kramer*
1 January 20132 April 2013 Marco Kurz
2 April 201326 October 2015 Markus Gisdol
26 October 201510 February 2016 Huub Stevens
11 February 201630 June 2019 Julian Nagelsmann
1 July 20199 June 2020 Alfred Schreuder
10 June 202026 July 2020 Matthias Kaltenbach
27 July 2020Present Sebastian Hoeneß

Recent seasons

The recent season-by-season performance of the club:
SeasonDivisionTierPosition
1999–00Verbandsliga NordbadenV1st↑
2000–01Oberliga Baden-WürttembergIV1st↑
2001–02Regionalliga SüdIII13th
2002–03Regionalliga SüdIII5th
2003–04Regionalliga SüdIII5th
2004–05Regionalliga SüdIII7th
2005–06Regionalliga SüdIII4th
2006–07Regionalliga SüdIII2nd↑
2007–082. BundesligaII2nd↑
2008–09BundesligaI7th
2009–10BundesligaI11th
2010–11BundesligaI11th
2011–12BundesligaI11th
2012–13BundesligaI16th
2013–14BundesligaI9th
2014–15BundesligaI8th
2015–16BundesligaI15th
2016–17BundesligaI4th
2017–18BundesligaI3rd
2018–19BundesligaI9th
2019–20BundesligaI6th

;Key
↑ Promoted↓ Relegated

Hoffenheim made their debut in European competition in 2017, qualifying for the play-off round of the 2017–18 UEFA Champions League play-offs. Their first match was on 15 August 2017, losing the first leg of the play-offs 2–1 to Liverpool.

Matches

UEFA club coefficient ranking

RankTeamPoints
95 Molde FK15.000
96 FC Midtjylland14.500
97 1899 Hoffenheim14.328
98 Hertha BSC14.328
99 1. FC Köln14.328

Most goals

; Bundesliga
#NameYearsGoals
1 Andrej Kramarić2015–55
2 Sejad Salihović2006–201546
3 Vedad Ibišević2007–201243

Women's team

The women's team started playing in 2006–07 and rushed through the lower leagues. The women's team plays at Dietmar-Hopp-Stadion and is currently coached by Jürgen Ehrmann.