1. FC Saarbrücken continued its sensational winning streak in the DFB Cup. There was a 2-1 (1-1) draw against Borussia Mönchengladbach in the quarterfinals.
The overjoyed sensational winners of 1. FC Saarbrücken performed celebration dances – the badly beaten losers of Borussia Mönchengladbach watched the wild hustle and bustle in disbelief. The third division soccer team continued its fairytale winning streak in the DFB Cup with a 2-1 (1-1) win against the favorites and is in the semi-finals for the fifth time after a triumph in the rain battle. The explosive southwest derby against second division team 1. FC Kaiserslautern will take place there on April 2nd.
“Insane. We’re a cup team. It was a fight. We just ran after the ball. That’s crazy,” said match winner Kai Brünker on ZDF: “Now we want to go to Berlin.”
After the successes against Karlsruhe, Bayern and Frankfurt, Amine Naifi (11th) and Brünker (90th + 3) provided the temporary highlight of the cup victory, and in 2020 they even made it to the semi-finals as a regional league team. 34 days after the cancellation due to weather, Gladbach’s initial lead from Robin Hack (8th) was not enough.
After the cup disgrace, the season could no longer be saved for coach Gerardo Seoane’s team, which was also weak in the Bundesliga – the Gladbach players stood in front of their fans in deep sadness at the end.
On February 7th, the game was canceled just five minutes before the scheduled kick-off because of the masses of water on the pitch; the risk of injury was simply too great. The green in Ludwigspark was then renewed for 200,000 euros, but concerns remained about the lack of drainage. Referee Robert Hartmann gave the final go just before kick-off on another rainy Tuesday.
“Playable, but difficult,” said Gladbach’s sports director Roland Virkus on ZDF. “We have to adapt our style of play to the conditions,” demanded Seoane. But it took a certain amount of getting used to in front of 15,903 spectators – the opening minutes belonged to the outsider, Kasim Rabihic narrowly missed a shot after 180 seconds, and a deflected shot from Robin Becker went over (7th).
Gladbach used the following corner to counterattack. After Marcel Gaus made a mistake, Franck Honorat came to the baseline on the right and Hack easily used the flat cross pass. But Naifi responded with a hard-hitting shot from 18 meters. As a result, the FCS became cocky and invited the foals to counterattack. Rocco Reitz made a mistake in front of Tim Schreiber (15th), then Lucas Boeder made an artistic save on the line after a triple chance (18th) and Hack missed a free-standing shot (21st).
As a result, the Saarlanders retreated further, and Gladbach had significantly more problems. The game plodded along until halftime. After the change there was even more water on the pitch and a well-kept short passing game was hardly possible anymore. A battle of attrition developed with many high balls, with the Rhinelanders increasingly establishing themselves in front of the FCS goal. But the guests lacked creativity and precision. Therefore, there were no opportunities. Then the outsider struck.