1. FC Cologne
El Mala scores again, but: “What we still have to do…”
November 29, 2025 – 7:47 p.mReading time: 3 minutes
Said El Mala saves 1. FC Köln a point at SV Werder Bremen in stoppage time. The 19-year-old afterwards raved about the feeling of celebrating the goal.
Once again Said El Mala has the 1. FC Cologne provided the highlight of the match day. After two defeats in a row, the Billy Goats seemed to be sliding into their first crisis in the away game at Werder Bremen. But then the 19-year-old secured FC a point with his fifth goal of the season.
It was the second minute of stoppage time when El Mala – one of the few Cologne players with normal form to date – grabbed the ball again on the touchline. The 19-year-old picked up the pace, left his opponent standing and ran into the Bremen penalty area. There he actually shot towards the far corner with his strong right hand. But the ball was deflected. Lucky for El Mala, because the ball hit the short corner so that the final score was 1-1.
“When you have a player like that who goes one-on-one even in the last minute, you’re lucky that the ball gets deflected,” said midfielder Tom Krauss afterwards. “As a team, we keep him grounded and try to bring him to his strengths. Then he can help us a lot.”
What followed the goal was pure joy. El Mala jumped up, clenched his fist and sprinted towards the visitors’ block. “It’s always crazy to score a goal in front of our fans,” said El Mala on “FC-TV”. “Of course you wish it would work sooner, but as long as it works in the end and this is one of our weapons, why not?”
For the first time, El Mala played a full season Bundesliga game on Saturday. Coach Lukas Kwasniok also praised this afterwards. “It’s an important realization that he can now play 90 minutes in the Bundesliga. That’s a difference to the 3rd league,” praised the FC coach, who had carefully developed the youngster. “It’s well known that he can make the difference for us. What’s important is that he retains the will to improve. He has that.”
Kwasniok emphasized that El Mala also lost balls while dribbling more often during the 90 minutes. “But it’s admirable that he doesn’t think about it but tries again in the next situation.” Then he added with a smile: “What we still have to manage: Sometimes he’s so fast that he doesn’t give his teammates time to move up.” Things ended well on Saturday, the deflected shot was enough to win the point.
But El Mala also made no secret of the fact that his team had not performed well for a long time. In the first half in particular, the Billy Goats fell far short of expectations. Kwasniok even spoke of an “energy problem” his team had, which they only got under control at half-time.
“We actually had a good match plan and prepared very well. But I don’t know the reasons why it didn’t work out,” said El Mala. “In the second half, even with the two substitutions, we had more stability in the run-up and with the second balls. We were significantly better there.” In the end, El Mala benefited from his improved teammates – and El Mala FC. The billy goats were able to return to Cologne as ninth in the table with 15 points.