Heidenheim relegated after final-day defeat to Mainz

1. FC Heidenheim are back in Bundesliga 2 after a 2-0 defeat to FSV Mainz 05 on Matchday 34 ended their three-year stay in Germany's top flight. They finished 17th with 26 points, and the final table left no room for anything else.

Frank Schmidt's long run still defines the story

Frank Schmidt has been at the helm since 2007, and that matters here as much as the result itself. He guided 1. FC Heidenheim from the sixth tier to the UEFA Conference League, then into a maiden top-flight campaign that ended with an eighth-place finish. That is the scale of the climb, and it is why this relegation will feel different from a normal drop.

The numbers tell the season's harsher truth. 1. FC Heidenheim won six, drew eight and lost 19 of their 33 league matches. A goal difference of -29 underlines how thin their margin was across the campaign, even if they had only lost two of their final eight matches before relegation was confirmed.

The last day still settled it. FSV Mainz 05 did the damage with the 2-0 win, and the club now has to reset for Bundesliga 2 after a three-year top-flight spell that began with so much more promise. What remains next is a return to the second division, with Schmidt still the central figure in how Heidenheim are judged and how they rebuild from here.