SC Freiburg Haberleri

“Benni is a solid presence within our trio of goalkeepers and is an important figure in our team, both on a sporting and personal level,” said sporting director Klemens Hartenbach. “It’s a good feeling for us to know that Benni, along with his character and reliability, will continue to be part of our team.”

SC Freiburg’s newly confirmed fixtures:

The players left at the club will play Austrian side SCR Altach on Thursday at 14:00 CET behind closed doors. Altach, currently coached by Miroslav Klose, are bottom of the Bundesliga, but did earn a point against league leaders RB Salzburg at the weekend.

There was just one change to the team that had given the Italian record champions a run for their money on Thursday, with Vincenzo Grifo coming into the starting line-up in place of Lucas Höler.

Mainz strong at home in the second half of the season

On this special evening, SCF were tasked with keeping their patience. The Bianconeri sat deep and did not offer much in the way of active attacking intent. The away side only ventured into Freiburg’s penalty area once in the opening stages, as Juan Cuadrado appealed for a penalty under pressure from Christian Günter (19’). Dutch referee Serdar Gözübüyük was unmoved, however.

There is also a lot of respect from SC’s opponents. Immediately after the game, Juventus‘ head coach Massimiliano Allegri, said, “We won against a strong opponent. The game in Germany will not be easy.” Midfielder Manuel Locatelli added to this: “We will need a mature performance in Freiburg to get through to the next round.”

Patrick Baier has been part of the coaching team since 2009 and is the longest-serving assistant coach in the Bundesliga.

The will shown by the bottom-placed side to change that story as quickly as possible was clear to see from the start. With just 10 seconds on the clock, Ilhas Bebou missed Mark Flekken’s goal by mere centimetres. Freiburg then quickly got themselves stuck into the game, and made perfect use of their first big chance. Vincenzo Grifo crossed looking for Michael Gregoritsch, causing chaos in the Hoffenheim back-line – Eggestein dispatched the rebound with aplomb, giving former Freiburg ‘keeper Oliver Baumann no chance in goal and making it 1-0 to SCF on five minutes. It was midfielder Eggestein’s first goal of the season.

“I watched a Hoffenheim game on the flight to Turin,” he said. Following a narrow 1-0 defeat to the Serie A side on Thursday evening, Streich commented, “I’m not thinking of the second leg at all yet. We have an important game against Hoffenheim on Sunday, and are in a good position in the league still.”