25th matchday
Victory in slow motion: Leipzig gives Darmstadt no chance
The Leipzig players celebrate after Darmstadt’s Thomas Isherwood’s own goal to make it 1-0. photo
© Jan Woitas/dpa
Leipzig obviously dealt with the end of the premier class well. The Saxons celebrated an unchallenged success against bottom team Darmstadt.
After being eliminated from the Champions League, RB Leipzig returned with a must-win in the everyday Bundesliga and entered the duel for fourth place with Borussia Dortmund. The cup winner won 2-0 (1-0) against the bottom team Darmstadt 98 and at least temporarily moved past BVB into fourth place. Dortmund will play against Werder Bremen on Saturday evening.
In front of 44,319 fans, Darmstadt’s Thomas Isherwood (3rd minute) gave Leipzig an early lead with an own goal. In the second half it only took a few minutes until substitute Christoph Baumgartner scored (50′).
After the demanding performance on Wednesday at Real Madrid, in which a 1-1 draw was not enough to advance, coach Marco Rose changed his starting eleven to four positions. Among other things, the injury-prone high-class technician Dani Olmo was given a break; winter newcomer Eljif Elmas was in the starting line-up for the first time. The 23 million euro offensive man had previously only made seven short appearances in the Bundesliga.
Lieberknecht changes to seven positions
And Darmstadt? There was a lot of mixing after the humiliating 0:6 loss against FC Augsburg. Coach Torsten Lieberknecht brought seven newcomers into the starting line-up. At first that didn’t help much, as Darmstadt was already behind in the third minute. Raum crossed sharply into the middle after a corner, where Willi Orban and Isherwood fought for the ball – and the Darmstadt player scored into his own goal.
After the dream start, Leipzig limited themselves to combinations worth seeing, but forgot about scoring goals. Elmas, Lois Openda and Instead, Darmstadt signed up. Gerrit Holtmann (23rd) tested RB keeper Peter Gulacsi with his shot, who deflected for a corner.
Leipzig misses numerous opportunities
The expected duel developed between top favorite Leipzig, who had never lost against a promoted team in 30 games, and Hesse, who had not won since the sixth matchday. The hosts had almost 70 percent possession of the ball, Darmstadt tried its luck on the counterattack. RB repeatedly got into the promoted team’s penalty area quite easily, but then complicated things unnecessarily.
After the break, RB had significantly more power to score. Openda (47th/48th) failed twice in front of Darmstadt goalkeeper Marcel Schuhen. Baumgartner, who came on for Elmas, did better and shot from the edge of the penalty area after a nice individual effort; Schuhen was powerless. It was the eleventh joker goal this season, the best in the Bundesliga.
Leipzig now had chances almost every minute, Darmstadt’s players threw themselves passionately into every ball. Since Leipzig then retreated a little, there was more play for Darmstadt – and the Hessians took advantage of it. Oscar Vilhelmsson and Tobias Kempe tested Gulacsi in the 66th minute, at least the Swede’s chance could have been a goal.