Mith the last squad and after being outnumbered for 70 minutes, Bayer Leverkusen suffered a bitter defeat in the Europa League. The Werkself lost 1-0 (0-1) to Czech champions Slavia Prague on Thursday and suffered a setback in Group C after the 6-2 opener against OGC Nice. After Nice with Hapoel Be’er Sheva from Israel on Thursday Defeated 1-0, all four clubs in Group C now have three points, but Bayer are still leaders.
Bayer had to do without six injuries, with four places left in the squad. After a questionable red card against Karim Bellarabi in the 21st minute, Bayer had to play more than two-thirds of the game with ten players. Leverkusen kept the 0-0 for a long time, goalkeeper Lukas Hradecky even parried a penalty from Nicolae Stanciu, including a margin (64th). But then Prague scored the winning goal through Peter Olayinka (80th).
“The penalty was unnecessary, but thank God I saved myself. And then we get an unnecessary goal, “said Hradecky at Nitro:” We made it difficult for us with the red card. But the attitude was good, we played compactly. So it’s a shame that it didn’t end 0-0 or 1-1. ”The coach was angry too. “The defeat was completely unnecessary,” said Peter Bosz at Nitro: “It’s difficult when you have to play with ten men from the 22nd minute. But even with ten men we mustn’t lose the game. “
The tragic person for the first 20 minutes was Bellarabi. In the third minute, the former national player, who was only brought in three times as a joker, missed the huge opportunity to quickly lead the Bayer team, which had changed to seven positions. Slavia goalkeeper Ondrej Kolar had put the ball right into his feet, but the 30-year-old shot from an acute angle next to the empty goal instead of serving the completely free-standing Lucas Alario.
Finally, after getting on board against Lukas Provod, to the surprise and horror of the Bayer Bank, he saw straight red. “Actually, a clear case for the VAR,” tweeted the club: “But he’s free today” League only used from the knockout round. Surprisingly, the Czechs, who have only played one game in the domestic league since October 4th due to the season break, did not give up their wait-and-see attitude afterwards. The ten from Leverkusen rarely found gaps in the stable Prague defensive.
After the break, Slavia took over the command more and more. Bayer seemed to be content with one point in terms of strength. When Scottish referee William Collum rightly gave a penalty for a foul by Hradecky on Olayinka, Hradecky kept strong. He was powerless against Olayinka’s header from Prague’s very first corner. One minute before the end of regular time, substitute Nadiem Amiri missed Bayer’s greatest chance to equalize, but his direct purchase just missed.
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