Euphoria in Münster, fear of failure at Dynamo Dresden. The starting position ahead of the top match on Saturday is clear.
As a promoted team, Preußen Münster are once again in the promotion battle. The march through to Bundesliga 2 is now in their own hands.
The course will be set in the next three games. They face Dynamo Dresden, Jahn Regensburg (both at home) and SSV Ulm. The top three in the table in a row – then we’ll know more.
One thing is clear at the moment: 11,744 spectators will be cheering on the sold-out Preußen-Stadion on Easter Saturday when Münster have the chance to overtake Dynamo.
And it will be against an opponent who is hanging around the corner. A clear lead in the league has been almost completely squandered since the winter break.
On Sunday, Dresden narrowly escaped a major embarrassment in the national cup against the top division team from Plauen, only equalizing shortly before the 120th minute and advancing in a penalty shoot-out.
Coach Markus Anfang, who had already raged after the derby defeat in the 3rd division in Aue, then spoke plainly for the second time – followed by a reaction against RWE.
Now clear words again. He emphasized to “Tag24” with regard to his existing personnel: “We rotated a bit, gave many players the opportunity to show themselves. Even if people talk about the fact that we have the best squad in the 3rd division and that we have a lot of talent. But talent alone is not enough. It also takes a lot of work. Quality is when you’re able to call on it again and again throughout the season. I was a bit disappointed with one or two of them that they didn’t take their chance. But well, that’s just the way it is. We have to work on that. It’s always easy to say that we have the best squad, but sometimes that’s not true. Some of them are still a long way off. We’re trying to get them there.”
Words that show that things are not going well for the big promotion favorites, who invested a lot of money to get into the 2nd division, who also accepted a significant minus in the balance sheet for the promotion.
The pressure is therefore on the Dynamos, even in Münster, where they will be without several players on Saturday. Three suspended players will be missing, and the absence of Dresden’s top scorer Stefan Kutschke (eleven goals, four assists) is particularly painful, as is the absence of midfield stalwart Paul Will, who, like Kutschke, has played in all 30 games so far this season. In addition, central defender Kevin Ehlers will also have to take a break following his red card.
Not good conditions for the runners-up in the table…