Third division club Rot-Weiss Essen celebrated their fourth home win in a row against SC Freiburg II (4:3). Two key players were missing.
After the defeat at Preußen Münster (1:2), Christoph Dabrowski, head coach of Rot-Weiss Essen, demanded a significant improvement in performance from his team in the home game against SC Freiburg II:
“For us, it’s about making up meters after the last game. We have to go to a different level of energy and put on a passionate performance.”
No sooner said than done: RWE defeated SCF’s second team 4-3 in a crazy game and reclaimed fourth place in the table. “Running meters”, ‘another level of energy’ and ‘passion’ were all attributes that RWE displayed for long periods on this Saturday afternoon at Hafenstraße. Even after the double strike shortly before half-time and the third Freiburg goal after the break, the team managed to turn the game around completely in the final phase with a lot of mentality.
Rather, it was poor conversion of chances and erratic defending that almost cost RWE a home win or even a point. The team from Essen can and must improve. “We defended naively. But we still had faith in our ability to turn the game around. That’s why pride prevails. But we still have to look at the problem,” explained Dabrowski afterwards.
Of course, the fact that two important defensive pillars, Felix Götze (flu) and captain Vinko Sapina (knee problems), were missing against Freiburg II was also part of the truth.
Felix Götze started running again today and will train normally tomorrow. I expect him to be available again on Tuesday. Vinko tried it in the final training session, but still had slight problems. We didn’t want to take any risks in view of the English week. However, he also trained individually again today. We are trying to do everything possible to get him back on the pitch on Tuesday.
Christoph Dabrowski.
It is still to be decided whether the two key players will be back in action in the upcoming away game at 1860 Munich (February 6, 7 p.m.). However, Dabrowski was optimistic when asked by RS after the final whistle, as was Björn Rother:
“Felix Götze started running again today and will train normally tomorrow. I expect him to be available again on Tuesday. Vinko tried it in the final training session, but still had slight problems. In view of the English week, we didn’t want to take any risks. However, he also trained individually again today. We’re trying to do everything possible to get him back on the pitch on Tuesday. Björn Rother (ill, editor’s note) will also train again tomorrow. He has completed a running training session for the last two days.”