Despite a late shock
Ten Freiburgers secure direct entry into the EL round of 16
Updated on January 29, 2026 – 11:15 p.mReading time: 1 min.
For SC Freiburg, the journey in the Europa League continues. The Breisgauers have secured a direct entry into the round of 16.
SC Freiburg suffered a 1-0 defeat in France after conceding a goal in stoppage time, but they still qualified directly for the round of 16 of the Europa League as seventh in the table.
Lille relied on fast, agile attackers and posed a threat at times. Freiburg, on the other hand, stood deep and didn’t come up with a single offensive action in the first half. However, SC goalkeeper Noah Atubolu wasn’t really challenged either. “If you don’t do that well with the ball, then you have to at least defend it to the end,” said sports director Jochen Saier, who was hoping for an improvement in an interview on RTL+ during the half-time break: “One would hope that we would get a little better with the ball.”
The Freiburg team followed their words with actions, at least for a short time: Shortly after the restart, however, Junior Adamu initially lacked the speed of action (51.). Shortly before his substitution, he completely missed the ball in front of the Lille goal (57′). On the other side, Matias Fernandez-Pardo failed alone in front of Atubolu, who couldn’t be outwitted by a lob (64′).
The game was now a little more fast-paced. Atubolu had more to do until the final whistle, but even after Maximilian Eggestein was sent off (74th minute), the Lille attackers were only able to overcome him with a penalty in stoppage time from Olivier Giroud.
