Werder Bremen won in Stuttgart, thanks in large part to their brilliant strike duo – and a pinch of luck.
Dogfight: Konstantinos Mavropanos in a duel with Niclas Füllkrug (right).
IMAGO/Philippe Ruiz
“Stuttgart is in a relegation battle. It was clear to us that it would not be a pleasant game,” said Niclas Füllkrug after the 2-0 win at VfB at DAZN and admitted that Werder had problems at the beginning. In fact, the beginning belonged to the Swabians, who basically sold well, but got on the loser road after the change of sides.
That was also associated with a good deal of bad luck, because before Jens Stage made it 0-1, everything was going against Stuttgart: Referee Frank Willenborg let a robust entry from Füllkrug run against Atakan Karazor, who was already in the air, before Stage slipped the ball over the instep in such a way that it hit the left angle untenably.
Füllkrug didn’t know why his action against Karazor went unpunished, but he pointed out that he was “more often involved in aerial duels”, “then it’s more robust – I think that’s ok and I don’t complain about every thing.”
If the same happens to me, then no foul will be called.
Maybe that’s why the 29-year-old didn’t complain too much about his 35th-minute goal not being scored, although his assessment in this case is contradictory.
Füllkrug’s supposed 1-0 didn’t count because a foul against Hiroki Ito had been decided. “If I push him in the air, I would say it was definitely a foul,” said the striker, knowing full well that Ito was not in the air at that scene.
He also surmised that “if the same thing happened to me, no foul would have been called.” Nevertheless, he admitted that Ito got “a bit of physical contact” and finally explained: “You don’t have to whistle, but you can.”
So Füllkrug didn’t score himself in Stuttgart, but he was involved in both goals of the Hanseatic League, because he put on Marvin Ducksch’s worth seeing 2-0 – all in all it was a satisfactory performance, especially since Bremen went home with three points .
