Peter Knäbel, Hamburger SV's sporting director, met Bruno Labbadia and spoke about the squad for next season.
After a few weeks without clarity, HSV found an answer to the problem - what should they do with players, whose contracts are expiring?
It is clear that Rafael van der Vaart, who joined Real Betis, and Marcell Jansen, who hasn’t found a new club yet, will leave Hamburg and won’t get new contracts.
It was also confirmed that the centre-backs, Heiko Westermann, Slobodan Rajkovic and Lasse Sobiech, who joined FC. St Pauli, will not get new contracts at the club and will have to search for a new one.
The fact that Maximilian Beister didn't get a new contract is a big shock for the majority of the fans, because he is from Hamburg’s own youth. The winger had a long period of injury and didn't reach a real comeback during four different coaches this season.
A few hours after the cancelation of Beister's contract, which cost HSV around €0.25m, Mainz 05 confirmed his arrival on a free transfer.
Gojko Kacar and Ivo Ilicevic, on the other hand, both got offers from the club and have the possibility to renew their contracts, but only one-year deals which are performance-based. At the moment, it’s not clear if they will sign new contracts, but Kacar made the impression that he wants to decide soon.
For HSV they have lost very loyal players, but will save a lot of wages and this is one of the problems of Hamburg - finances.
It has been known for a while that HSV has a lot of debts, which are allegedly about €100m. Especially Westermann, Jansen and van der Vaart were expensive players and made it difficult for HSV to start saving money and pay off these debts.
Moreover, HSV might actually convince their biggest talent, Jonathan Tah, to stay at Hamburg. Even though he is very interested in joining Bayer 04 Leverkusen and following ex-Hamburg players like Heung-Min Son, Hakan Calhanoglu and Levin Öztunali to Westfalen.
At the moment, there would be only three centre-backs including the 19-year-old and Tah looks certain to play.
A face of Hamburg's downfall?
Heiko Westermann, who joined Hamburg from Schalke 04 for €9m back in 2010, played 173 matches. This means whole 15.169 minutes for the 'Rothosen', and he helped them to survive twice in the Bundesliga. He was also the captain of the team for three years and a German international at his time in Hamburg.
Although he wasn't the best player in Hamburg's squad, becoming more and more of a cult hero, hashtags like '#HW4', which is a mockery of Cristiano Ronaldo's 'CR7', emphasise this.
He played a lot and gave his best for the team. He missed only eight matches for Hamburg and didn't get a single red card during his time at the Elbe.
Sometimes, the fans say that Westermann was a reason behind Hamburg's downfall. Before he joined, Hamburg played in the continental competition for four years in a row. After his transfer, they reached seventh place in Bundesliga, but this was the single exception. The rest was simply fighting against relegation.
However, next to the criticism is even so praise for the 31-year-old ex-international. He was always an honest guy, who said what he thought off the pitch.
One quote should still stay in the heads of the most German football fans, which he said after a draw against Dortmund, where he played very well: "The critics and idiots, who believe they founded the football, can kiss my a**. I am always here and take the blame. I won't let them destroy my name."
He doesn't know where his future in football will lead him. He will take his holidays for a while and will take the time to decide.
Rajkovic's time at Hamburg ends
Slobodan Rajkovic joined Hamburg after the old sporting director of HSV, Frank Arnesen, and also the former sporting director of Chelsea FC, brought him with Gökhan Töre, Jeffrey Bruma and Jacopo Sala to HSV from the London club..
It is a little miracle that Rajkovic is the one and only remaining player from the 'Arnesen era', after his story at Hamburg.
At the beginning of season 2012/13 he had an argument with Heung-Min Son in training and was suspended for a while. He played for the U23 and had a torn muscle fibre, but he didn’t give up.
In January 2013 he made his comeback for the first team. However, in September of that year, he suffered a medial collateral ligament tear and cruciate ligament rupture and was absent for a whole 10 months.
He fought back and returned once again against 1. FC Köln. HSV lost, but he gave everything, just like he did in all matches before with the 'rhombus on the breast'.
In marked contrast to Westermann, Rajkovic has already got an offer from PAOK Thessaloniki, where Frank Arnesen – of course – is the sporting director.
Beister - the homegrown player
Beister was born in Göttingen and played for HSV since 2005, where he went through all the youth teams and then played on loan at Fortuna Düsseldorf - making his breakthrough.
He helped Düsseldorf to reach the Bundesliga with some very good performances and scored after one minute in the second leg of the relegation game - the scandal match - against Hertha BSC. Overall, he scored in this season in 12 goals in 35 matches and assisted a further 13.
Certainly in Hamburg they had high expectations after his return, but he wasn't able to cope with these. Beister scored eight goals in 39 matches and assisted seven in the following two seasons
Last season he was out for almost the whole season, after picking up an injury in the training camp in January 2014. He played five matches in Bundesliga and five in the Regionalliga, where he couldn't prove himself.
Beister can concentrate on his new challenge now. Mainz 05 confirmed on their website the free transfer of the winger and that they are very delighted of having signed Beister.