By Sean McGinley
The Bundesliga season for the men of JSV Speyer came to an end with more drama than expected. Although from a sporting point of view there was no longer anything at stake for either team in terms of relegation or participation in the final round, there was a lot of excitement between JSV and TSG Backnang on Saturday evening.
After long and intense battles, the Speyer team were 9:5 winners and even unexpectedly climbed to third place in the final table because JC Leipzig couldn’t get beyond a draw in Offenbach.
The man of the day for the JSV was Felix Bächle, who had the staying power and prevailed in two marathon fights with a total of over 18 minutes of fighting time – once to ensure the half-time lead and once to secure the overall victory. “It’s really impressive how Felix, at just 17 years old, withstood the pressure, looked for his chance and in the end won these important points for the team,” said JSV team boss Michael Görgen Sprau, praising the 60-kilogram man, who was in his two Seasons has become an important performer at the JSV.
Previously, Yves Touna had also prevailed in a hard-fought duel against Yannick van der Kolk in extra time. He repeatedly cleverly thwarted his opponent’s deep attempts to throw, withstood the pressure and, after a total of six and a half minutes, took his chance to make the decisive throw, which sparked a storm of enthusiasm among himself and the JSV team next to the mat. Philip Müller’s victory was less dramatic but no less valuable, as he rolled away his opponent after just ten seconds. Müller’s reliability and consistency is one of the factors that formed the basis for JSV’s success this season. “For me, Philip is the man of the season. Originally he was supposed to alternate with Michel Adam in the class up to 73 kilograms, but due to Michel’s injuries he was practically alone. But he only lost a single fight,” said the JSV team boss .
Franz Haettich also made a quick decision in his favor. Things went less well for Onise Bughadze, who had a strong and internationally experienced opponent in the form of the Belarusian Mikita Sviryd, to whom he had to admit defeat, as well as for the returnee Pierre Louis Guerin, who, despite having a superior grip, was unable to take any decisive action against his Backnanger opponent Ben Rommel could and in the end was thrown by him. Samuel Mendel was also unlucky – from Speyer’s point of view, the decisive score against him should actually have been given in his favor.
The half-time score of 4:3 was closer than hoped, and the task of finding the best line-up for the second half with the three required changes was anything but easy. “We would have liked a bigger lead and then just left four people in who had won,” said Michael Görgen-Sprau, who after careful consideration decided to award Andreas Benkert for Guerin, Till Braunbach for Mendel and Erik Seith for Touna bring. “I was sure that Philip, Franz and Felix would win again and I was betting that another point would result somewhere,” said the JSV team boss, outlining his thoughts during the break. This was to happen, but not before further drama had ensued.
In the first fight after the break, Bughadze was determined to make up for his defeat in the first round, but was caught by Sviryd right at the start and fell painfully on his elbow and shoulder, not only losing the fight but also sustaining a painful injury.
The fight was now over at 4:4. Philipp Müller put the JSV back in front with another confident victory, this time by holding, but immediately afterwards Erik Seith lost to van der Kolk – 5:5. The next fight felt landmark. Both teams brought new fighters up to 66 kilograms – Till Braunbach for Mendel on the Speyer side and Janno Brodnig for Robin Angerer at Backnang. After two minutes, perhaps the biggest celebration of the day came when Braunbach threw his opponent onto his back and turned triumphantly to the ecstasy on the Speyer bench. Now the JSV was in pole position, but the victory was not yet in the clear. Franz Haettich took the next step with another quick victory thanks to his strength in ground combat, then came Bächle’s second marathon appearance, which secured the overall victory. The final victory of Andreas Benkert, who was able to score a wazaari three seconds before the end of the fight time, crowned the success.
“It was a hard-fought victory, but fully deserved. It’s great that we ended the season on such a positive note. We were third before, but this time we have more points than ever before and finish the season just one point behind Esslingen. “A nice success, especially given the bad luck with injuries after the summer break, a great end to a great season. Who would have thought that we would be so close to the top teams in the end? The only downside was the injury to Onise Bughadze,” said the JSV team boss , who is already looking forward to building on the performances shown with this team next year.
2023-09-26 14:28:00
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