26th matchday
End of the penalty series: Burkardt shoots Mainz to 16th place
Mainz’s Jonathan Burkardt celebrates after his penalty goal to make it 1-0. photo
© Torsten Silz/dpa
Perfect match day for Mainz 05: a win at home, the competition loses. Coach Henriksen achieves something that his two predecessors were unable to do.
FSV Mainz 05 has thanks in the relegation battle of the Bundesliga Jonathan Burkardt celebrated an important victory and jumped into the relegation zone. Coach Bo Henriksen’s team won 2-0 (1-0) against VfL Bochum on Saturday and moved past rivals 1. FC Köln on matchday 26. Burkardt (45th + 3 / penalty kick / 71st) scored both goals in front of 33,300 spectators and rehabilitated Mainz after the hearty 1:8 at FC Bayern exactly a week ago.
The Cologne team had already lost 1:5 against Champions League contenders RB Leipzig on Friday evening. The bottom of the table, SV Darmstadt 98, also came away empty-handed in the home game against FC Bayern Munich (2:5) on Saturday. With 19 points, Mainz is now in 16th place. In April, the 05ers will play against Darmstadt and Cologne in front of their own crowd. Even the guests from Bochum (25), who were harmless this time, are only six points ahead of Mainz after the defeat.
In contrast to Bo Svensson (zero wins) and Jan Siewert (one win), Henriksen is now the first Mainz coach to be responsible for two successes in this league season – in just five games.
Speedster first climax
The head coach had changed four positions in the Rheinhessen starting eleven. On the pitch, Mainz looked stable defensively and didn’t allow much in the first half hour. The problem was: There wasn’t much going on in attack either, Bochum’s Manuel Riemann was hardly challenged at first.
The flash of Darmstadt’s temporary 1-0 lead against Bayern and a young speedster who fooled several stewards and ran off the pitch himself were the preliminary highlights. At least the fans were able to cheer briefly for the young fan’s dynamic solo.
After that, things also got better in terms of football: First Jae-sung Lee served into the path of Burkardt, who had his best chance to date (35th) failed because of the straddling Patrick Osterhage. Then the 05ers received a penalty before the break because referee Matthias Jöllenbeck judged slight contact by Bernardo against Lee as worthy of a penalty.
The execution was delayed several times – also because Bochum’s bank protested vehemently and there were wild discussions on the pitch. But Burkardt didn’t let this unsettle him and scored from the bottom left to take the lead. After four missed shots from the spot, it was Mainz’s first penalty goal of this Bundesliga season. Striker Ludovic Ajorque made two mistakes right at the start of the season.
Schwalbe issues a warning
After the change, the Bochum team also called for a penalty. But Osterhage had so obviously fallen to the ground that he even received a warning from Jöllenbeck because of Schwalbe. Substitute Philipp Hofmann then scored to make it 1-1 (57′), but the goal was called back due to an offside position.
Bochum became more offensive, but really compelling actions were rarely achieved. For Mainz, Burkardt (66th) hit the top of the crossbar. A few minutes later he scored his second goal and the game was decided. Burkardt was substituted in the next situation and passionately high-fived coach Henriksen.