2nd league on Saturday
Düsseldorf (dpa) – FC Schalke 04 has come a big step closer to the announced return to the football upper house. With a 3-0 (1-0) win over 1. FC Heidenheim, coach Mike Büskens’ team stormed to the top of the second division table.
Thanks to the headers of Dominick Drexler (35th minute) and Simon Terodde (90th + 6th) as well as the stroke of genius from Ko Itakura (52nd) in front of the Schalke season record crowd of 57,126 spectators, the Bundesliga relegated ranks for the first time in a direct promotion place. “That makes the day perfect,” enthused goal scorer Drexler on Sky. With a win in Nuremberg in the evening, SV Darmstadt can still overtake the Revierclub.
When jumping to first place, the royal blues benefited from the 1-1 (1-0) in the top game between FC St. Pauli and Werder Bremen. In front of 29,546 fans in the sold-out Millerntor Stadium, Daniel-Kofi Kyereh (43rd minute) put the Kiezkicker in the lead, which Niclas Füllkrug (58th) equalized after the break. Before Darmstadt’s evening game, Werder (53 points) and St. Pauli (52) are second and third in the table. “In the end we were closer to the lucky punch than St. Pauli. We were able to show that we can also play such a game dominantly,” said Bremen goal scorer Füllkrug.
1. FC Nuremberg won three important points in the promotion battle and reduced the gap to the relegation place to three points. In the top game in the evening, the “Club” beat SV Darmstadt 98 3-1 (1-0). Nikola Dovedan (43rd minute) and Lukas Schleimer (82nd) put Nuremberg, who are now one place behind fourth-placed Hesse in the table, in the lead. Luca Pfeiffer (58th) provided the equalizer in the meantime. An own goal by Andre Leipold (90+6) made the decision.
Fortuna Düsseldorf took an important step towards staying in the class. Thanks to the 3:0 (1:0) on Friday over the recently rising Rostock team, the team, under the direction of new coach Daniel Thioune, remained unbeaten in the eighth game and increased the gap to relegation place 16 to eight points for the time being. “This victory is really good for us. The last few weeks have been challenging for us because we have had to explain again and again why we couldn’t get the lead over time,” commented Thioune.
On the other hand, there was no winner in the Bavarian duel between Regensburg and Ingolstadt. The 1:1 lead at half-time gave the guests a leap from last to penultimate place, but it was probably not enough to achieve the miracle of staying up in the league. Nevertheless, FC attacker Christian Gebauer was able to see positive aspects of the team’s performance: “We have to take this passion and fighting spirit with us. We need both of those in the upcoming games.” The new tail light is Erzgebirge Aue after the 1:3 (0:2) against Hannover.