Werder Bremen knocked off Schalke 2-0 on the road in the 33rd game day of the Bundesliga to defend their third place in the league. Mesut Özil and Hugo Almeida scored the...
Werder Bremen knocked off Schalke 2-0 on the road in the 33rd game day of the Bundesliga to defend their third place in the league. Mesut Özil and Hugo Almeida scored the...
Werder Bremen knocked off Schalke 2-0 on the road in the 33rd game day of the Bundesliga to defend their third place in the league. Mesut Özil and Hugo Almeida scored the goals for Thomas Schaaf’s team.
The Werder coach Schaaf started with Hugo Almeida in the line-up as a second striker along with Claudio Pizarro. The Portuguese international replaced Aaron Hunt, who was only on the bench after muscular problems during the week, while Tim Borowski played for Marko Marin. The sold-out crowd of 61,673 at Veltins Arena saw an exciting match from the start with Schalke the better team in the first half. Bremen lost a number of unnecessary balls and allowed the hosts to play their game.
The first chance of the game went to Schalke after 22 minutes as Tim Wiese misplayed Rafinha’s cross and Kevin Kuranyi’s header glanced off the crossbar. At the other end, Claudio Pizarro was unlucky as Schalke keeper Manuel Neuer made a fine save from short distance. And the teams went into the break deadlocked at 0-0.
Werder came out of the changing room the more motivated team and jumped ahead after 55 minutes through Mesut Özil as the German international dribbled through the Schalke defence and beat Neuer from 16 yards. Thomas Schaaf’s team kept pushing forward. Schalke defender Edu made a mistake, which Hugo Almeida took advantage of to make it 2-0 in the 64th minute. And that was essentially the decider. The victory gave Thomas Schaaf’s team a two point lead over fourth placed Bayer Leverkusen going into the final game of the season next weekend at Weser Stadium against Hamburg. And Bremen can secure the qualification for the Champions League on their own.
Schalke: Neuer - Rafinha, Höwedes, Bordon, Schmitz (59’ Edu) - Westermann, Kluge (75’ Moritz), Rakitic - Farfan, Hao Junmin (59’ Gavranovic) - Kuranyi
Werder Bremen: Wiese - Fritz, Mertesacker, Naldo, Pasanen - Frings, Borowski, Bargfrede, Özil (88’ Hunt) - Almeida (83’ Jensen), Pizarro
Goals: 0-1 Özil (55’), 0-2 Almeida (64’)
Yellow cards: Rafinha (72’) - Özil (61’)
Referee: Knut Kircher (Rottenburg)
Veltins Arena: 61,673 spectators (sold out)
