2nd league
St. Pauli remains undefeated – newly promoted Elversberg third
Every reason to celebrate: Pauli’s Marcel Hartel (l) celebrates the opening goal. photo
© Axel Heimken/dpa
FC St. Pauli is eager for the city derby against HSV. The second division leaders are still undefeated and are storming towards the Bundesliga. A newcomer is causing a stir.
The leaders initially did not let themselves be deterred by the 0-1 deficit after Junior Brumado converted a hand penalty (9th minute). Within eight minutes, St. Pauli turned the game around before the break. With another penalty converted by Brumado (80th), Rostock came close again and put the leaders under pressure, but were unable to equalize.
Manolis Saliakas (15th), Marcel Hartel (18th) and Oladapo Afolayan (23rd) scored the goals for Hamburg, who are now looking forward to Friday’s derby against city rivals Hamburger SV. After 14 match days, St. Pauli is three points ahead of HSV with 30 points.
Newcomers continue to be strong
Newcomer SV Elversberg continues to cause a stir and is involved in the promotion race after the 4:1 (1:1) win against SC Paderborn. Coach Horst Steffen’s team really turned up the heat after Luca Schnellbacher made it 2-1 shortly after the break (50′) and went on a counter-attack frenzy. Paul Stock (57th) and Maurice Neubauer (60th) made consistent use of the space that was now available. During the first break, Schnellbacher equalized the visitors’ lead by Sebastians Klaas (22′) with his first goal of the day (41′). Elversberg is three points behind HSV.
At the bottom of the table, coach Tobias Schweinsteiger’s leave of absence from bottom club VfL Osnabrück did not prove to be the relief he had hoped for. Lower Saxony also lost under interim coach Martin Heck – this time 0-2 (0-0) against 1. FC Magdeburg. Baris Atik (52nd) and Luca Schuler (71st) scored for the guests. With only seven points so far, Osnabrück is increasingly losing sight of the non-relegation zone.