It is not known what they think of it at ZFC Meuselwitz. The small football club from Thuringia was recently compared to a big football club from Madrid in the TV show “Sport im Osten”, and it was obvious why the regional league team had to serve as a reference: ZFC Meuselwitz is not Real Madrid. And because glitz and glamor are clearly distributed in this comparison, anyone who has the choice would rather play against the multiple European Cup winners than against a club whose appeal is possibly only increased by the fact that Meuselwitz has a cheerleading division in addition to the football division. and cone department maintains.
Why is this worth mentioning? Because on Tuesday evening the stadium announcer in the Leipzig Arena reminded that not so long ago RB was still bobbing around in leagues in which games against ZFC Meuselwitz were on the program. But a few years and far more millions pumped into the club later, the royal Real Madrid was actually a guest. And this important visit, as the stadium announcer explained, was ultimately only due to the generous man who made such “wonderful football evenings” possible in the first place: the businessman and billionaire Dietrich Mateschitz, who died last Saturday.
Mateschitz, the inventor of the RB sports empire, was appropriately commemorated in the Leipzig Arena. There was a minute’s silence of applause and then the action continued with a Champions League group game, which was also rewarded with applause from the crowd. After all, a 3-2 win against Real Madrid is a unique event in RB Leipzig’s young history. “It was a great evening,” said RB coach Marco Rose, looking so jaded as if he had just measured himself against ZFC Meuselwitz or FC Augsburg.
Duels with Real seem to suit Leipzig better than games against teams with limited resources
On the other hand: Maybe Rose bit back his grin, because after the sparkling real there are opponents who are less fun. In other words, teams that play classic outsider football and often involve Leipzig in unpleasant close duels until the noble technicians in front lose their desire and the defenders in the back lose their order. Because with such opponents, Rose was reminded of this at the latest when the hard-fought 3: 3 at FCA at the weekend, his team does not really get along well. Duels with Real seem to suit Leipzig a bit better.
RB also performed more than properly in the first leg in Madrid, the goals conceded to make it 0: 2 only came in the final phase, when Real had raised its level of efficiency and seriousness to the maximum. And if Real does that, there is no remedy for it. In the 70 minutes in Madrid and in the 90 minutes in Leipzig, however, RB showed what the team can do when body tension and concentration are right. “We defended diligently and had a great rate of duels,” praised Rose. It was also true that Real were missing three of their finest footballers in Luka Modric, Federico Valverde and Karim Benzema on Tuesday, which is why the otherwise blind understanding in the team sometimes looked more like a careful sniffing of the individual parts of the team. “We played the game in a way that we didn’t want,” said Real Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti.
“Today we took the chance”: Timo Werner (right) completes a Leipzig counterattack with the goal to make it 3-1
(Photo: Matthias Koch/Imago)
But Leipzig also knew what they had to do that evening to inflict the first defeat of the season on the favorites: They involved Real in duels almost as consistently as Augsburg had done with them last time. Except that Leipzig didn’t retreat to their own penalty area, but instead relied on stable midfield pressing, which served as the basis for high pressing attempts. “We played a similar game to the first leg,” said substitute attacker Timo Werner, “only today we took our chances.”
For the sake of completeness, it must be mentioned that most of these chances had one and the same originator: RB attacker Christopher Nkunku had his fine feet in almost everything that was somehow dangerous, and it was almost consistent of him that he only kept out of the comparatively banal dust-off goal by Gvardiol (13th minute). Nkunku’s actions contained such a rare blend of power, elegance and speed that even Ancelotti’s second eyebrow must have raised at times. The Frenchman threw the second Leipzig goal rustically under the crossbar (18th). And when Real pushed for an equalizer after Vinicius Jr.’s goal in the meantime, it was Nkunku who danced out his opponent on the sidelines and put the ball through for a Leipzig counterattack, which Werner completed to make it 3-1 (81′).
It looked suspiciously as if Nkunku wanted to use the evening to audition for a future Real Madrid engagement. But the impression was deceptive: Shortly before the end he committed a clumsy foul, which was sanctioned with a penalty for Real and the goal to make it 3-2. Can happen. But it shouldn’t happen again next week when a head-to-head match with Shakhtar Donetsk decides who will advance to the knockout stages. One point would be enough for the people of Leipzig. And if that works, ZFC Meuselwitz will surely be remembered again.
