Football Season Guide

Widely expected to suffer from the second season syndrome after their struggles in the second half of the 2018/19 campaign, Hartberg made a mockery of such predictions by finishing fifth and qualifying for Europe via the play-offs. A rather small club, they have performed admirably since winning promotion to the top flight a couple of years ago and the big positive for them going into the new campaign is that they managed to keep hold of both of their highly-rated boss Markus Schopp and striker Dario Tadic, who had a superb campaign last time around. In fact, the sole two players of any importance to have left are Jodel Dossou, who will continue his career in France, and David Cancola, who could not agree a contract extension. The other players to have left hardly featured last season, either due to their manager's choice or due to injury issues. On the other side, several interesting signings have been made in Julius Ertlthaler, Manfred Gollner and Stefan Goles, while Felix Luckender has had his deal made permanent after spending the previous season on loan with the club. Hartberg can only stay up for years if they are well run and follow a model based on stability and this is something that they have definitely done well so far. They have not changed much over the summer and will be hoping for another successful season.