You can sometimes even learn something for life from perimeter advertising in the football stadium. “Fortune favors the brave” was read behind the goal in Bochum’s Ruhrstadion on Saturday. Freely translated: “Happiness belongs to the brave.” The fast-paced game played in front of these gangs certainly confirmed the truth of this aphorism, even if the Borussia Dortmund footballers did not look exactly happy after the final whistle.
The hosts from VfL Bochum had defended well for 90 minutes, and Dortmund had run hard and tirelessly for just as long, but because luck didn’t want to commit itself ultimately in the face of this stalemate, it decided to 1: 1 (1: 0). Sebastian Polter gave Bochum the lead with a penalty five minutes before the break, Julian Brandt equalized for Dortmund to make it 1-1 five minutes before the end.
“Luck and bad luck have always played a small role,” Brandt said afterwards on Sky, “but today it wasn’t all just bad luck. In the end, you have to want it, you have to get into the balls with more conviction.” 20:5 shots on target and 15:0 corners should have been enough for BVB to win, but in front of the eyes of coach Marco Rose, who was only watching from a box with a yellow-red ban, they missed the very best scoring chances. “There were also a few lighter ones,” complained Brandt, who came on as a substitute in the 68th minute after suffering a concussion in the 3-2 defeat by Bayern Munich a week earlier.
There is always something between Dortmund and scoring
The nerves of the locked-out Rose and the assistants Alexander Zickler and René Maric, who represented him down on the edge of the field, were badly strained because Bochum knew how to prevent a goal in the most creative way for 85 minutes. In the 18th minute, VfL keeper Manuel Riemann saved with his foot after a shot by Jude Bellingham in the manner of a handball goalkeeper, in the 48th minute central defender Erhan Masovic headed a ball off the goal line and in the 54th minute he grabbed Referee Matthias Jöllenbeck himself, because when Marius Wolf scored, BVB colleague Bellingham was passively offside and Riemann blocked the view.
Despite a two-minute check by the video assistant Timo Gerach, Jöllenbeck then watched the scene himself on the monitor after there had been debates a week earlier in Dortmund’s 2-3 win against Bayern because Felix Zwayer was not after a controversial foul in the penalty area himself had gone to the screen.
Brandt hits a volley after a Haaland cross
However, Jöllenbeck’s decision against the BVB goal was correct, and so it was to take up to the 85th minute before Brandt scored the well-deserved and overdue equalizer with a volley after a cross from Erling Haaland. The Bochum audience in the stadium filled with 13,799 spectators howled.
“Nevertheless, we’re absolutely happy with this point,” said Bochum coach Thomas Reis. “Against a team as strong as BVB it was a bonus game for us, so it’s also a bonus point.” He deserved the draw despite Dortmund’s stunning statistics: “I don’t care about the statistics today, because of our mentality we deserved this point.”
To be honest, there were few clearer penalties this season: Gregor Kobel sent Christopher Antwi-Adjei.
(Photo: Ina Fassbender/AFP)
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The game was particularly ungrateful for BVB goalkeeper Gregor Kobel, who didn’t have much to do over the course of the 90 minutes, but owed the goal to make it 0-1 in the 40th minute because he had beaten the fast Bochum winger Christopher Antwi- Adjei rudely sabered in the penalty area. After a fabulous through ball from Bochum’s Elvis Rexhbecaj behind the Dortmund defense, Kobel stormed towards Antwi-Adjei, who was approaching like an ICE and only realized shortly before the collision that he had miscalculated. “I have to do better than that,” he said guiltily afterwards. When the penalty was only slightly shot by Polter, Kobel jumped into the wrong corner.
For BVB it was the very first draw in a competitive game this season, but it felt like a defeat. When asked about the six points behind leaders Bayern Munich, Kobel said on Sky about the need to catch up: “It will be very, very difficult.” Assistant coach Zickler didn’t want to contradict him: “Three points would have been important to keep up with Bayern.” Zickler knows how difficult it is to catch up with Bayern. He was German champion with them seven times between 1994 and 2005.
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