SSuch evenings between unbridled cheers and loud horror have for years been fuel for football’s knaves, who, in their anger at the relegation of their team, throw firecrackers around, set off cannon blasts and even small fires in the stands, which they consider their property. lay. This is what happened late on Tuesday evening when the four-time German champions 1. FC Kaiserslautern returned to the second division after four frustrating years in the third division.
That was clear at the latest after the 2-0 lead in added time thanks to Philipp Hercher’s late goal (90+3). But before the remaining two minutes could be properly completed, chaotic Dresden igniters and provocateurs in the notorious K-Block of the Rudolf Harbig Stadium had briefly taken control of a game at a standstill.
Their outburst of anger, precisely filmed and registered by a thousand police officers, was something like the raven-black shadow that had lain over the temporary farewell of SG Dynamo Dresden from the second Bundesliga before the Berlin referee Daniel Siebert, who was stoically waiting for the end of the pyromaniac excess brought the long-decided encounter over time.
Kaiserslautern back in league two
There was celebration on the opposite side of the grandstand, where 3,000 fans lifted the “Red Devils” into the sky, who created the facts with Hercher’s goal and that of Daniel Hanslik to make it 1-0 (59th), which counted purely sportingly that evening. Unfortunately, there were also a few rioters hiding in the crowd of FCK fans, who threw firecrackers and pyromaterials around before the game. One of these blind people even fired a flare into a family block in Dresden – and fortunately did not cause any damage.
The menacing conclusion wanted to be set by particularly rabid Dresden culprits, who were forced into the Dresden team’s cabin wing. They were held at bay by Dynamo security after a brief scuffle, but two stewards were injured. The approximately 30 rioters are now being investigated for breach of the peace. The control committee of the German Football Association also initiated proceedings against both clubs after the events, as the DFB announced on Wednesday when asked by the dpa.
This evening with the bitter end for the Dresdeners, who were promoted to the third division for the fourth time, belonged to the overjoyed winners, who recently had to go through a lot when, after three defeats from the last three third division games, the almost certain direct promotion was lost and as a consequence coach Marco Antwerpen, popular in the team, was fired. An unpopular decision, but probably not the wrong one, because FCK hired Dirk Schuster as his successor, a relegation specialist.
Shortly before the end, the game had to be interrupted for a few minutes because of the Dresden supporters.
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Image: dpa
The gnarled and battle-tested Saxon had suffered a 1:3 home defeat with the Darmstadt 98 team in Bielefeld in 2014 and, when the away goals rule was still in force, turned it into a 4:2 win after extra time at the second division sixteenth team that had been relegated. This cobbler has the hop-or-top games “on it”, as has now been shown again in Dresden. “We focused on the fact that relegation is not a punishment, but an opportunity,” he said, describing the moment when self-doubt gave way to new confidence. The players believed in themselves and their chances of promotion again.
1. FC Kaiserslautern seized it after the tough 0-0 in the first leg at Betzenberg in Dresden’s second leg after the break, when the Palatinate used their momentum and with a boost of energy pulled away from the Dresdeners, who repeatedly failed due to the famous goalkeeper Raab or their own awkwardness . On the day of the decision, the spirit of the Lauterer Eroberer met the self-doubt of the Dresden collective, which had not even won the second half of the second division. Schuster enriched his thanks to his players with a few warm words to his predecessor, who divorced in anger, and praised the Lauterer “joint work”.
Almost receded into the background: the big celebration of 1. FC Kaiserslautern
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Image: dpa
The Dresden players, on the other hand, had understandably retreated to their dressing room without a word. Coach Guerino Capretti, who, like sports director Ralf Becker, has to fear for his job in Dresden, described the ghostly atmosphere in the dressing room as follows: “The boys are crying, there is absolute emptiness.”
The winners of the evening, however, celebrated extensively with their fans and then turned their team bus into a party zone on the hour-long drive back to the Palatinate. Central defender Kevin Kraus issued the ultimate celebration slogan: “Today we’ll let the pig out – until we lose our native language.” But that would be a shame, since the party with the lucky climbers should continue this Wednesday in Kaiserslautern.
