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Plenty of chances, no goals
VfB began the game boldly and created a number of scoring opportunities in the opening period, with Serhou Guirassy (3′) and Chris Führich (6′) both going close. The latter, who was particularly lively, had another opening five minutes later when he cut inside from the left, only for his shot to be well saved by Jiri Pavlenka.
The guests weathered that early storm, however, and subsequently grew into the game – Leonardo Bittencourt seeing his low drive well saved by Florian Müller (15′). Guirassy was taken off with an injury and as a result VfB’s tempo dropped, allowing Bremen to assert their control over proceedings. Niclas Füllkrug had the ball in the net with a header (35′) but it was disallowed for a shove on Hiroki Ito, while shortly before the interval both Marvin Ducksch (42′) and Führich (45’+2) went close to breaking the deadlock.
Clinical visitors
The second half began in a cagier fashion, possession of the ball frequently switching between the teams until Bremen took the lead out of the blue. The VfB midfield lost two duels in quick succession following a long punt forward from Pavlenka, the ball eventually bouncing off Konstantinos Mavropanos and into the path of Jens Stage, who smashed the ball high into the net from the edge of the area (59′).
VfB enjoyed a period of superiority after that, albeit without creating any real danger in the final third. Instead, it was Werder who struck again following another long ball from Pavlenka. This time Ducksch curled the ball over Müller from the left-hand corner of the box (77′) to seal a 2-0 victory for the away side.
Goals:
59′ minute (0-1): Mavropanos inadvertently plays the ball into the feet of Stage, who rifles the ball into the top-left corner.
77′ minute (0-2): Ducksch takes aim from around 20 metres out, curling the ball over Müller and into the net.
Reaction
VfB head coach Bruno Labbadia: “We’re disappointed. We started the game really well and made Werder do the running, but you could see that we lacked precision in the final third. After Waldemar Anton‘s yellow card and Serhou Guirassy’s injury, you could sense a change in the game. We fell behind from two great strikes, but we weren’t able to make the most of our chances up front. We couldn’t change the course of the match after that. It’s a disappointing home defeat for us. Now it’s important to stay calm, to analyse the mistakes and to build the team up again.”
