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The Bundesliga 24/25 playoff between Heidenheim and Elversberg will decide the last participant in the next season of the German elite league.
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If you don’t remember very well how the Relegation (for the Germans) works, we’ll explain it to you!
The 16th-placed team in the BuLi faces the 3rd-placed team in the 2. Bundesliga to decide whether we will have three relegated teams in the First Division – or three promoted teams – in the next season.
Of the 26 relegation playoffs in the history of German football, 20 were won by the top-flight team, 77%, according to Bundesliga information.
In the last 12 relegation playoffs, 11 were won by the team trying to avoid relegation – which makes Heidenheim the favorite in the confrontation, at least from the statistical side.
Duel between small cities
Heidenheim, with around 50,000 inhabitants, facing Elversberg, with 13,000, represents the “smallest” relegation playoff of all time.
To give you an idea, the playoff from last season, between Bochum and Fortuna Düsseldorf, pitted cities with 372,000 people and 613,000, respectively.
In 2022/23, Stuttgart, with 632,000 inhabitants, escaped relegation against HSV, from Hamburg – the second-largest city in Germany, with 1.85 million.
Chance to make history
If they achieve promotion, Elversberg will become the smallest team in history to play in the Bundesliga, being the 59th different club to participate in the German football elite.
They [Heidenheim] have assembled a quality squad that can play in the Bundesliga and the Conference League. They are very flexible and can change during the phases of the game… We will do our best to influence the game with our performance and then we have to hope that the opponent is not so focused, so we can take advantage of it.
Elversberg has gone through a journey to reach this chance to make history.
In the 2021/22 season, the club was in the Regionalliga Southwest – the fourth division of German football – and this is only their second season in the 2. Bundesliga.
The team led by Horst Steffen scored 58 points in 34 games, finishing just one point behind runner-up Hamburg, who were promoted directly, along with champions Cologne.
They scored 64 goals, less than only Hamburg (78), and had the best defense in the Second Division, with 37 conceded.
Only striker Fisnik Asllani scored 18 goals, finishing on the podium of top scorers, behind Martijn Kaars (19), from Magdeburg, and Davie Selke (22), from HSV.
Retropective
Heidenheim and Elversberg have faced each other only twice in history, in the 3. Liga in 2013/14.
Heidenheim won once, 1-0, with a draw, 1-1, in the other game of the season.
Frank Schmidt, Heidenheim’s coach, praised his rival on Thursday, in a recent interview.
For me, [Steffen] is the coach of the year. When I see what he has achieved with Elversberg, how he managed to build a team that plays such successful football. I have great respect for him. That’s why I’m also looking forward to this confrontation, because we can show that we can impose ourselves against them.
Heidenheim surprised in the Bundesliga, less than a year ago, when they debuted in the German elite, finishing in eighth place, with a spot in the UEFA Conference League playoffs.
The dispute in the European competition, however, had a cost in the performance in the Bundesliga.
The club flirted with relegation for much of the season and needed a late surge to secure the relegation playoff.
And who will take part in the Bundesliga 2025/26?
📸 Christian Kaspar-Bartke – 2025 Getty Images
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