DFB Pokal, Round 1: SV Wehen/Wiesbaden vs FC Sankt Pauli 3-2

Business as usual

source: http://www.inforadio.de

OK, under normal circumstances this should be full of things like “FFS”, 🤬, “&%^*%#@@)&$”, etc, etc. No. From now on and considering our excellent record (100% disqualification success against Liga 3 squads since the latest transformation of Liga 3 in 2008/9), we will start approaching 1st round DFB Pokal games as impossible missions or as friendly matches against clubs like Real Madrid or Barcelona. So, yesterday FCSP almost touched the dream of quaification to the 2nd Round but unfortunately the momentum of the opponent and the overtime fatigue got the better of us. To the squad: heads up boys, one of these years we’re going to make it happen and the celebration that will take place it will be really unprecedented! Regarding the rest of us, let’s have a look at what happened yesterday, read on…

 

Seems that even the Club has declared DFB Pokal out of scope. Yesterday, just before the 2nd half (well done Greg, excellent perception!) noticed that squad wasn’t using the 3rd “Pokal” outfit. As kindly Kleiner Tod reminded me, this isn’t the first time, the 3rd jersey is practically no “Pokal” jersey anymore. He’s right, it’s just an additional outfit, used primarily to fill some additional space in the Fanshop and maybe bring back some money that will be used both for the needs of the Club (that’s good) and UA (this is not, always possible to be used to dress some “military consultants” in some African or Asian country ^^). So, with no Pokal jersey in place, no Pokal, simple as that. However it’s still an obligation, we have to do this once a year and this is also known by the FCSP fans – some 2.000 of them made the (not really short) trip to support the squad…

Squad, feeling the burden of the match on their backs, got in the pitch in a hesitating manner. Nothing really interesting in the opening section of the game. First opportunity came for Wehen on 10′ with an Andrist shot ending up just wide. FCSP “reaction” came on 21′ with a pale Knoll shot that safely ended in Kolke‘s grasp. FCSP actually got in control of the game after the opening quarter but was unable to cash out the initiative in terms of serious chances. Sitiuations created towards Wehen‘s end of the pitch were similar to the one of 21’. We simply failed to make them feel really threatened regarding our overall pitch supremacy. And then came the punishment. Corner from the right for Wehen on 35′, ball in the heart of our box, the usual negligence by the FCSP defense and, after some bouncing in there, ball pushed into the back our nets by Reddemann and 1-0 just like downtown… No real reaction for FCSP except another, not so dangerous, Knoll shot (wide 37′) and some long balls towards Allagui. After one of of them, a collision between Kolke and Allagui led to Allagui‘s injury on 44’. He continued for the rest of the half, to be eventually replaced by Veerman (welcome!) at half-time, hopefully nothing serious, get well soon boy. Nothing more until the end, off to the dressing room with an 1-0 deficit for FCSP.

Sleeping lullabys for our defense in the box and the opener as result of them

Pushed by the 2.000+ brown white maniacs who had no problem to absolutely dominate the “battle of the terraces”, being the only ones heard, even after Wehen‘s goal, squad came into the 2nd half determined to get back into the game and thanks to a Wehen defensive negligence, we managed to do it really fast, in an occasion similar to the opening goal. Knoll corner from the right, an, unlucky for Wehen, Schönfeld backwards header and ball to Neudecker who, being all alone in this area of the box, behaved as a classy forward and finished the job, 1-1! The equalizer woken up the hosts who almost reached 2-1 on 53′ – good teamwork around the box and ball to Brandstetter, all alone in the 6-yard box in front of Himmelmann, with our central defensive pair Ziereis–Avevor properly wanking off… Fortunately Himmelmann‘s excellent reaction saved the day, actually if it wasn’t for him along the course of th 2nd half, we would probably never reach extra time… Blog comrade AndyChristos has set his sights to this pair for sometime now, some times excessively but, when seeing situations like this, I’m running out of counter arguments, wake up people, for fucks sake… From this point onwards and until the end of regular time, game started getting better and better with both squads choosing to fight for victory instead of going conservatively towards extra time, it actually became a fuckin’ rodeo in the closing minutes, start counting 😅 Good chance for FCSP on 65′ with Möller Daehli attempting from the upper left of the box, forcing Kolke to an excellent save! Corner immediately afterwards and Avevor header over the crossbar. New counter attack for FCSP on 66′, Möller Daehli race from the right flank, the excellent cross to, again alone, Neudecker but not so classy finish this time 🙂 Wehen attack on 73′, deep cross from the right with ball ending up to Andrist, whose air volley sent the ball not really far from Himmelmann‘s right junction. Big one for Wehen on 77′ with Himmelmann saving Schmidt‘s shot, almost from the penalty spot and making a 2nd save on the rebound by Schäffler – 2nd attempt called off for offside but this has nothing to do with what Robin did there. Temporary de-escalation for a few minutes and off to the dramatic closing section. Close call on 83′ with Veerman coming a little too late for contact, following Sahin‘s ball in the box. WHAT A CHANCE ON 86’ FOR FCSP! Excellent deep ball from Neudecker and outter space (some 50m), finding Veerman in the heart of the box. INCREDIBLE ball control by 2.01m Veerman but the immediate finish not up to par, Kolke was there ready and saved the day for Wehen, AAAAAARRRGHHH!!! 89′, game has gone wild, no FCSP defense to be found and Andrist marches all alone towards Himmelmann and 2-1 but Robin is again there to save our asses! Madness, still on 89′ and new BIG chance for FCSP, with Kolke this time saving incoming Veerman‘s 5m shot (no one around him as well) to corner – HELL!!! There was still a chance for FCSP, a dangerous free kick on 90+2’ but this time Knoll couldn’t repeat what he did on matchday 1, Kolke was there to save to corner. Nothing came up from this run-and-gun madness, full time 1-1!

The equalizer

Extra time underway, pace clearly decreased (couldn’t happen otherwise anyway, I don’t think that many in the pitch had played 120′ before 🙃), more conservative approach due to the course that game has taken and first chance for Wehen on 100′ with a good cooperation between Schäffler and Andrist which resulted to a powerful acute angled shot by the latter from within the box, Himmelmann was again there to repel the ball. Unfortunately we were to run out of luck really soon enough… Penalty for Wehen on 102′ awarded after a duel between Andrist and Ziereis. Looks really marginal but looks like a penalty, tough call oneway or another. Rocket execution by Schäffler in Himmelmann‘s (couldn’t do anything here) right corner, 2-1… But this wasn’t the end, real Doom arrived a couple of minutes afterwards… FCSP error, ball stolen by Wehen for a counter attack which ended with Schmidt scoring for the 3-1, all alone from the heart of the box. Yeah, FCSP defense was somewhere around but completely disorganised. To be fair, when you’re losing into extra time (not experienced in such crisis management, not really used playing ET), focus can get lost, seen worse under less pressing conditions… Half time ET 3-1, with everything looking completely lost…

Still, it wasn’t, at least not yet. 109′ in the game, deep Sahin cross from the right to, forgotten by the Wehen defense, Neudecker, immediate finish by him but ball on, both lucky and skillful here, Kolke but incoming Avevor took the rebound and finished from close distance. 3-2 with 10′ to go… FCSP threw everything in but in a completely unorthodox way. It wasn’t about trying to play organised football, it was about throwing everybody forward and trying long balls into the box in order to take advantage of the possible panic. Didn’t work. Passionate Wehen, defending massively had the answers, the only thing I can recall is a situation with Neudecker, probably not expecting the ball, losing control from a really advantageous position (could do it from there) on 120′. Wehen could give a more celebrational (not needed) tone to the victory but Andrist wasted a good one on 120+3. Full time Wehen 3 – FCSP 2, the annual Pokal short break is over.

3-1, Himmelmann asking the others what the fuck happened here

First of all, let’s be a little fair here, we’re not the ones having the privilege getting knocked out of the Pokal from lower league clubs in August, this is actually what Pokal is all about, here are a couple of interesting results from the first batch of Saturday games, completed earlier:

SSV Ulm (Regionalliga Südwest!) 2 – Eintracht Frankfurt 1 (Eintracht‘s only goal on 90’ ^^)

SV Rödinghausen (Regionalliga West) 3 – Dynamo Dresden 2 (on 120+3′, sweeeeeeet 🖕🏿😎🖕🏿😎🖕🏿 )

Still, we’re the Masters of the Art ^^

2010/11: Chemnitzer FC

2011/12: Eintracht Trier

2013/14: Preußen Münster

2017/18: SC Paderborn (had just been saved from Regionalliga thanks to 1860 going bunkrupt)

2018/19 SV Wehen Wiesbaden

Been all over this at the beginning of the post. We will not deal with this in a metaphysical manner, still this is the only way to deal with it without going bananas and it’s actually working, last night after the game I was feeling like we lost a summer test friendly in Spain or something. Let’s get over it, no drama required, it’s simply business as usual. The Boys in Brown came close to exceed themselves, unfortunately tradition and SV Wehen Wiesbaden (we knew that already, reed here) were two tough bastards impossible to beat. Let’s now get back to work, Union awaits next week and, if we don’t get our shit together, we’re in for a league reality check as well. So let’s stay calm, stay focused, work on our shit this week and go and eat them for breakfast next weekend, C’MON FCSP 😎☠️

Line Up:

Himmelmann

Dudziak Ziereis Avevor Buballa

Knoll

Sobota (Sahin 75′) Flum (Nehrig 79′) Neudecker

Möller Daehli (Diamantakos 98′)

                         Allagui (Veerman 46′)

Match goals:

1:0 Reddemann (35′, Left foot shot, Mockenhaupt)

1:1 Neudecker (51′, Right foot shot)

2:1 Schäffler (103′, Right foot penalty)

3:1 Schmidt (105+1′, Right foot shot, Brandstetter)

3:2 Avevor (109′, Left foot shot, Neudecker)

Spectators: 10007

Sankt Pauli cards: Buballa(1), Knoll(1), Ziereis(1), Diamantakos(1)

Match highlights (short but legal and high quality here

FCSP fans, more efficient than the squad 😎

 

Further reading:

• Kicker (German)
• Official website
• Kleiner Tod (German)
• Millernton (German)
• Outside Left