The Schalke 04 pros held their nerve: they won the basement battle against bottom-of-the-table Osnabrück 4–0 (1–0). The fans celebrated.
The frustration simply had to come out. Paul Seguin had just scored the second goal for FC Schalke 04 in the second division basement battle against VfL Osnabrück when he ran to the corner flag and hit it so hard in his goal celebration that it broke. Everyone at Schalke was as relieved as Seguin after his goal. The S04 pros withstood the immense pressure and swept the alarmingly weak bottom team off the pitch with a 4-0 (1-0) victory.
The reaction of the Schalke fans to the losing streak and the terrible play had been eagerly awaited, but they remained neutral. The Ultras Gelsenkirchen simply displayed a banner reading “No ifs, no buts – tear them apart for three points” and sent the pros off with chants of “Come on Schalke, fight and win” during the warm-up. The emotional highlight was the appearance of the Ruhrkohle choir, who sang the Steigerlied in the darkened arena ten minutes before kick-off.
While this gave the 62,000 spectators goose bumps, the same could not be said for the first half. It was a poor soccer game between two uncertain teams. Schalke made the slightly better impression, enjoying significantly more possession (64 percent), but this did not lead to good passes forward, instead resulting in endless cross-field passes between the defenders. Coach Karel Geraerts had somewhat surprisingly lined up his team in a 4-4-2 formation with a diamond in midfield, with three new players coming into the team: Paul Seguin, Tobias Mohr, and Simon Terodde.
Captain Terodde had the first chance after five minutes, but his header from Bryan Lasme’s cross flew just wide of the left post. If the fans were hoping for a lively offensive game, they were disappointed. Both teams showed major technical weaknesses, often losing the ball unnecessarily in their build-up play and making life easy for the defenses. Schalke owed their 1-0 halftime lead to an own goal.
After a corner from Paul Seguin, the ball rebounded off the head of Osnabrück’s Niklas Wiemann and past goalkeeper Lennart Grill into the net – although Marcin Kaminski was credited with the goal in the official DFB report. A bit of billiards, a bit of slapstick – but a lot of luck for Schalke. Almost nothing happened until the break, with Terodde only managing two more shots (31st and 45th minutes). Having scored from every difficult position imaginable two years ago in the promotion season, his slump continues. And Osnabrück? The bottom-of-the-table side had presented Uwe Koschinat as their new coach during the week, but there was no noticeable effect. The 6,000 Osnabrück fans who had traveled with the team were in much better shape than the eleven players on the pitch.
In the second half, Schalke played towards the north stand, which they had disappointed so often in recent times. And they played with much more energy and determination than before the break. Bryan Lasme had a header chance just 60 seconds after the break. The second goal came in the 49th minute: Schalke counterattacked against the advanced Osnabrück defense, Derry John Murkin made a pinpoint cross, and Paul Seguin scored with a low shot into the left corner to make it 2-0 and send the corner flag flying.
Just under ten minutes later, video assistant Timo Gerach helped Schalke score their third goal: after a duel between Wiemann and Terodde in the penalty area, referee Tom Bauer initially allowed play to continue, but then changed his mind after reviewing the footage. Terodde, who had been unlucky earlier, grabbed the ball himself and converted confidently to make it 3-0 (62). In the 71st minute, Kenan Karaman made it 4-0 with a header from a cross by Tobias Mohr.
The rest was a walk in the park. The fans in the north stand celebrated, and Schalke’s defense even achieved something special that evening: for the second time this season, they didn’t concede a goal.