Rot-Weiss Essen suffered a 3-0 defeat at league leaders SV Elversberg. However, the Bergeborbecker sold themselves dearly for a long time.

The streak of nine unbeaten games has come to an end: Although Rot-Weiss Essen put in a good performance for long stretches at league leaders SV Elversberg, coach Christoph Dabrowski’s team was ultimately beaten 3-0. Essen need to be more ruthless, especially in front of goal

RWE finally had enough chances to take the lead themselves. After five minutes, Thomas Eisfeld shot over the Elversberg goal after a pass from Isaiah Young. Four minutes later, new captain Felix Bastians failed with a header against Elversberg keeper Kristof. Then in the 17th minute, Young missed after a strong dribble against Manuel Correia and shot just past the post.

Elversberg’s first chance came in the 19th minute when Nick Woltemade failed to beat RWE keeper Jakob Golz after receiving a through pass from Luca Schnellbacher. Essen, however, continued to have the better chances: In one scene Young only hit the post, the follow-up shots by Lawrence Ennali and Simon Engelmann were cleared on the line. RWE could well have been leading at the break.

Essen remained dangerous after the break as well: A free kick by Thomas Eisfeld (51st) was caught by the wall, but his follow-up shot went just wide of the post.

In the end, however, it was the league leaders who took the lead: After Schnellbacher had again failed to beat Golz in the 55th minute, Manuel Feil gave Elversberg the lead after just over an hour: Schnellbacher found the midfielder with a pass into the penalty area, who then made it 1-0 for the hosts with a right-footed shot.

Dabrowski reacted and brought on a second striker, Ron Berlinski, who had to take a break in recent days due to a calf injury. It didn’t help: Nine minutes after the opening goal, Woltemade scored the decisive goal. After a one-two with Feil, the attacker on loan from Bremen scored to make it 2:0. In the final minute, substitute Israel Suerro made it 3:0.