The quarterfinals of the German Cup.
A hard fought battle in Frankfurt, where host eintracht started off fiarly well. however gradually Dortmund began to assert control of the match. Lucky for Frankfurt, the Neons missed a few good opportunities. The 2nd half was pretty much a repeat of teh first, with Dortmund graudually gaining the upper hand. Kehl extended Mkhitaryan’s corner, and Aubameyang snuck in at the far post to head home the winner.
A stunning result in Leverkusen, as 2nd division Kaiserslautern upset the Aspirins. And it wasn’t an undeserved victory, as FCK played hard and created chances, whereas Bayer mostly dicked around aimlessly like they expected their opponents to eventually give it up. When it looked to peter out towards penalties, Kaiserslautern pulled out a win with a late strike.
In a match nobody really cared about, Wolfsburg maintained the upper hand at Hoffenheim and advance. The VWs were just more clever, and never seemed like not getting the win.
Finally, another embarrassing performance by HSV. I don’t see how the board won’t now stump for bringing back hero Felix Magath. (Porbably end up firing themselves too, as the membership is sure to be outraged). And of course to drive the point home with viciousness, it was Bayern München that utterly kicked their ass. If the fans were assaulting the players last match, they’re probably already putting up the ropes with nooses on lampposts across the city now. It was literally a walk in the park for the defending Cup holders. (This stadium was originally know as the “Volksparkstadion”, but unlike the Berkeley version, this People’s Park didn’t even have dog poop to bother the visitors.) Bayern dominated from start to finish, and only because they were lazy that they didn’t score in double digits. This of course was the worst Cup defeat in club history for HSV, and to add insult to injury, captain Rafael van der Vaart had to leave injured.
Eintracht Frankfurt - Borussia Dortmund 0:1 (0:0) 51,500 *
0:1 Aubameyang (83., Kehl)
Bayer Leverkusen - 1.FC Kaiserslauterm 0:1 (aet) 25,244
0:1 Jenssen (114., Idrissou)
TSG Hoffenheim - VfL Wolfsburg 2:3 (1:2) 13,524
0:1 Rodriguez (26., penalty, de Bruyne)
1:1 Roberto Firmino (39.)
1:2 Rodriguez (44., penalty, Rodriguez)
1:3 Dost (64., Perisic)
2:3 Roberto Firmino (90. + 1, Salihovic)
Hamburger SV - Bayern München 0:5 (0:2) 57,000 *
0:1 Mandzukic (22., M. Götze)
0:2 Dante (26., T. Kroos)
0:3 Robben (54., T. Kroos)
0:4 Mandzukic (74., M. Götze)
0:5 Mandzukic (76.)
So 1.FCK is joining the chorus to have the lower ranking team host each game in the DFB Pokal which in terms of equity makes sense. The reward for going to Leverkusen and beating a higher ranked team is to have to travel to Munich to play in Bayern’s home stadium. How many 1.FCK fans will be able to make the trip and how many could get tickets is the big problem. The rich in the league get richer and the DFB does nothing to assist the smaller clubs reap the rewards for the hard work of defeating a higher team. Understand moving to a neutral stadium if smaller club’s stadium is not to standard, but the stadium in Kaiserslautern is more than adequate as noted by hosting five games in the 2006 World Cup.
Interesting comment. As far as I know, the “lower ranked team” only comes into place between DFL and DFB teams. So a 3.Liga (or below) team would always have home field advantage, but the Bundesliga and 2.Liga (officially Zweite Bundesliga) are treated the same. That being said, it would be nice for the lower league to always get the home field. The fact of the matter: there is almost always more fan-interest when the lower ranked team hosts, and that is good for the Cup in general. As for moving the match, it’s generally entirely up to the host side. While it might be a nice fantasy to see Bayern or Dortmund take on a village side on a dirt field, in fact given the potential financial windfall, the match will always get moved. Good example, Wuppertal hosted Bayern a few years ago, when WSV was 3.Liga. The Wuppertal home stadium had a theoretcial capacity of about 28,000, but such was the interest, the match was moved to Schalke. And the sold out stadium provided more income for WSV than entire year’s worth of 3.Liga…