Sascha Hildmann has been the coach of Preußen Münster for three years. He has experienced quite a bit since then.

Slowly, the series is getting uncanny. Since taking office as Preußen Münster’s head coach in January 2020, Sascha Hildmann has experienced a smorgasbord of curiosities that others have not experienced in their entire coaching career.

“I’ve seen it all in Münster. Firecrackers thrown on the pitch, six substitutions. The game at Schalke was abandoned because the alarm (a thunderstorm warning app, editor’s note) went off. I’ve seen it all. Now I’ve seen it all. So: it’s not boring,” laughed Hildmann incredulously after the match cancellation at BVB’s U23 team on Wednesday evening.

It started with the DFB Cup game against VfL Wolfsburg in August 2021, which was retroactively ruled in favor of Münster. Because the Bundesliga club substituted six players instead of the allowed five, the game was retrospectively awarded to Münster. Preußen advanced to the second round.

Then the legendary abandonment of the game at Hafenstraße in Essen followed. The game at Rot-Weiss Essen on February 20, 2022 was abandoned in the second half with the score at 1:1 after a firecracker was thrown from the Essen stands. Some of the Münster players were injured in the process, and two were subsequently unable to continue. The sports court of the West German Football Association ruled that the game was 2-0 in favor of Münster. In the end, however, RWE was promoted to the 3rd division because it had a better goal difference than Münster.

And it continues: On October 1, 2022, the game between Münster and Schalke 04’s U23 team was abandoned after 25 minutes with the score at 1-0 in favor of Schalke 04’s U23 team because the storm warning app went off multiple times in a row at the Parkstadion. Münster went on to win the rescheduled game.

And now the match cancellation in Dortmund. “It’s so blatant. Sitting down in that cubbyhole with the referees is something I’ve never experienced before either. But it’s always new, always blatant,” Hildmann shook his head.

The only good thing is that there is not a long distance between Münster and Dortmund, so he is relaxed about a new date in the new year. “We agreed that it would be nonsense to keep 5,000 people waiting. You have to ensure safety. And then kicking off the game at 10 p.m. at some point doesn’t make sense either,” said the 51-year-old.