On Tuesday evening (7 p.m.) in the round of 16 of the Niederrheinpokal,

Rot-Weiss Essen will travel to Oberliga club SV Straelen – a duel that RWE knows from past years.

On Tuesday evening, Rot-Weiss Essen will take a trip down memory lane. The third division club will be guests of SV Straelen, now in the fifth division, at the Römerstraße Stadium, which the Esseners know well from their days in the Regionalliga West.

“We are quickly back to reality. It’s about focus, concentration and simply getting the things done that are necessary,” emphasized coach Christoph Dabrowski at the press conference after the derby win over MSV Duisburg (2-1). The coach himself did not experience the duel, but he knows that it has become quite unpleasant for RWE from time to time.

Successful in Straelen, two defeats in Essen recently

Although Essen have won all three recent duels at the Römerstraße (1-0, 2-0, 1-0), they have stumbled against Straelen at Hafenstraße in the last two games.

The two teams met in Essen in the 2020/21 Niederrhein Cup semi-final. Back then, RWE looked like certain winners for a long time after Simon Engelmann scored, but Ferry de Regt equalized in the fourth minute of stoppage time. In extra time, Straelen even took the lead through Cagatay Kader, which Oguzhan Kefkir was able to equalize, but from eleven meters out, Straelen had the better nerves (4-2 on penalties).

Just a few months later, on the second matchday of the following 2021/22 season, SVS were guests in Essen again and this time won the game comfortably. A hat-trick from top scorer Kader and a goal from Timo Mehlich handed RWE a heavy 4-1 defeat.

Schommers “knows the score”

But it’s not just his personal history with Straelen that has RWE on its guard. “I think my colleague (MSV coach Boris Schommers, editor’s note) can tell us a thing or two about what’s possible in the Niederrheinpokal. We can too, as we saw last season,” Dabrowski said, looking back on Duisburg’s 1-0 defeat in extra time against Uerdingen, as well as their own games against ETB SW Essen (4-2 on penalties) and 1. FC Bocholt (5-4 on penalties) in the previous season, in which Essen only managed to win on penalties.

Accordingly, the coach and his staff want to “prepare the team for this – and then it’s just about getting through to the next round.”