The Sportfreunde Baumberg have somewhat soiled their previously spotless white waistcoat. ETB Schwarz-Weiß Essen annoyed the Monheimers.

“They have a qualitatively very good team. The central defence with Frederik Lach and Arman Corovic is very experienced, and so are the wing-backs. Going forward, the youth team is very strong and has a lot of pace. My coach colleague Damian Apfeld has a lot of quality there. This will be a very exciting Oberliga duel,” said Baumberg coach Salah El Halimi before Sportfreunde’s duel against ETB.

Sportfreunde Baumberg went into the match against Schwarz-Weiß Essen with six wins from six games. In the end, the league leaders had to settle for a goalless draw.

The best chance of the game belonged to ETB: Three minutes before the end of the game, the ETB supporters – around 60 fans had travelled with them – were already screaming for a goal, but a shot by substitute Dominik Reichardt (87th) from six metres was slightly deflected by a Baumberg defender at the last second and flew past the right post by millimetres.

ETB coach Damian Apfeld was happy with the point at the top of the league.

Apfeld summed up: “In general, we saw a good Oberliga match. It was a very even game. There were few scoring chances on either side. There was a phase towards the end of the game where we were in control and you had the feeling that if one team could win this game, it would be us. Unfortunately, we didn’t manage to do that. We took the point and can be satisfied with that. Baumberg are not only top of the table, they had won all their games and had shot the league to pieces by matchday 7. They had already scored 22 goals and we stayed nil here, which is very good.”

The 37-year-old added: “We are a bit crestfallen because we feel there was more in it here. But we have taken seven points from the last three games with a very good goal difference. That should give us even more confidence for the next games. We are on the up and developing week by week.”

On Wednesday (27 September, 7.30pm), ETB will then play 1. FC Kleve for a ticket to the last 16 in the Niederrheinpokal.

The statistics for the match

Sportfreunde Baumberg: Schwabke – Nishimura, Oscasindas, Harneid, Sitter – Sarikaya, Burovac, Sezer (90. Knetsch), Hömig, Klotz – Topal (76. Özden)

ETB SW Essen: Cordi – Dalyanoglu, Lach, Corovic (81. Kryeziu), Poznanski (85. Sahin) – Shavershyan – Zimmerling – Bosnjak (70. Reichardt), Addai (85. Williams), Cissé – Kesim

Referee: Markus Wollenweber

Spectators: 120