Loss after lead

VfL Wolfsburg suffered their first defeat in their fourth pre-season friendly against Spezia Calcio, who were relegated from Serie A last season. Watched by a crowd of 1,300 at the MS-Technologie-Arena in Villingen, Niko Kovac’s side took an early lead through Jonas Wind but ultimately went down 2-1. On Saturday they play their final two friendlies against US Sassuolo Calcio (15:00 CEST) and Celta Vigo (17:00 CEST) before the DFB Cup match at Makkabi Berlin.

VfL head coach Niko Kovac: “I’m only partly satisfied with the game today. We saw two completely different halves, like the friendly against Lens. In the first half we did very well tactically, put the opponents under pressure and forced errors. We didn’t manage to do that as much in the second period. We want to give every player the chance to showcase themselves. We’ll then make a decision for the start of the season from the knowledge we have.”

Göz Atın

Wind sends Wolves into last 16

Encounter with history

Final say: St. Pauli

VfL Wolfsburg – 1st half: Pervan – Cozza, van de Ven, Lacroix (C), Baku – Kaminski, Vranckx, Svanberg, Cerny – Gerhardt, Wind

VfL Wolfsburg – 2nd half: Pervan – Cozza, Zesiger, Bornauw, Fischer – Franjic, Arnold (C), Vranckx – Tomas, Pejcinovic, Wimmer

Goals: 1-0 Wind (9’), 1-1 Krollis (55’), 1-2 Esposito (72’)

Attendance: 1,300

The Wolves‘ summer schedule