35.3 kilometers per hour: Dominik Kohr has probably never been so fast since the speeds of the players were measured in the Bundesliga. And the FSV Mainz 05 midfielder shouldn’t have been any slower in the 34th minute of the game at Borussia Mönchengladbach after his central defender Maxim Leitsch found a major air hole and allowed Marcus Thuram to counterattack. Alone in front of goalkeeper Robin Zentner, the Gladbach striker put a cross on Florian Neuhaus – but before he could push in, Kohr came rushing in and cleared the corner with an outstanding tackle.
It was one of the key scenes in Rheinhessen’s 1-0 away win, and it wasn’t just sports director Martin Schmidt who was “surprised that we didn’t fall behind”. Bo Svensson’s men chased his team into their own half, pressing, barely allowing them a decent pass forward and winning second balls too. As “fighting willing and above all very, very brave”, Schmidt praised the “DAZN” microphone for the approach prescribed by the coach to stand high and put pressure on to rob the strong Borussia of their abilities.
This approach resulted in four chances to score in the sixth minute alone. It was foreseeable that the 05ers would not be able to pull through this force and this pace until the half-time break. And as soon as they pulled back, Gladbach counterattacked. Thuram completed the first dangerous attack after half an hour, but hit the crossbar. A little later he should have acted more stubbornly so as not to let Dominik Kohr become the savior.
And while Nico Elvedi prevented Karim Onisiwo from scoring from a dangerous position at the last moment (38′), Zentner threw himself into the next Thuram chance at the other end of the field (43′).
Anyone who, like Martin Schmidt, expected Svensson to want to see his team lower and more compact in the second half was wrong – it was supposed to start the same way as at the beginning of the game. The decision came in the 55th minute: first Ko Itakura prevented Karim Onisiwo, who had broken free, from continuing, a foul for which the Japanese saw the red card. Then Aaron put the free kick from 20 meters into the upper left corner. The guests were not particularly clever with their majority, but they managed to get their third away win of the season over time.
