Schalke 04 takes the lead in the tight battle for promotion in the 2nd division with a narrow home win. The star striker continues to improve his scoring rate. And for Bielefeld, the losing streak continues.

FC Schalke 04 has taken another step closer to returning to the Bundesliga.

The local club won 1-0 (1-0) against promoted Arminia Bielefeld and extended its lead at the top of the 2nd Bundesliga table. It currently has a five-point lead over fourth place, but its rivals still have games to play this weekend.

Once again, it was star striker Edin Dzeko who scored for the hosts in front of 62,077 spectators on Friday evening in the sold-out arena. The opening goal (15th minute) was the Bosnian’s fifth goal of the season in his fourth home game. He will turn 40 on March 17.

While Schalke missed chances up front, Bielefeld almost equalized in the closing stages (81st minute), but the supposed goalscorer Grodowski was offside when Roberts Uldrikis passed him the ball.

After the sixth 1-0 win of the season, Miron Muslic could breathe a sigh of relief. The Schalke coach said: “I loved a lot of things about our game today. During the warm-up, there was already an energy in the stadium that made us know the place was on fire – and all that was missing was a spark from the team. We then played against a team that defines itself by its intensity, just like us. Both teams covered 120 kilometers in the first half alone. That’s intensity and mentality.“

Muslic summed up: ”We found the key to unlocking the game before halftime and created many more scoring opportunities after that. The chances were definitely there to score a second goal after the break. We played excellently at times, but at other times the opposition kept us at bay. It’s always dangerous towards the end, especially because Arminia are strong at set pieces, but that’s part of the game. Nevertheless, we defended everything. I think the victory is perfectly justified. Now we’ll keep going.”