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1. FC Union lost their third Champions league game, at home to SSC Napoli, falling to a single second half goal from Giacomo Raspadori. Despite having been the better side for much of the game – they were diligent, intelligent, and fast on the break – but they will have to look back on another hard luck story as they train their focus on to the Bundesliga and Bremen on Saturday.
1. FC Union Berlin: Rönnow – Trimmel, Doekhi (79. Tousart), Knoche, Leite, Gosens – Aaronson (70. Král), Khedira (70. Laïdouni), Haberer (79. Volland) – Becker, Fofana (70. Behrens)
SSC Napoli: Meret – Di Lorenzo, Rrahmani, Natan, Mario Rui (71. Olivera) – Cajuste (46. Elmas), Lobotka, Zielinski – Politano (82. Lindström), Raspadori (71. Simeone), Kvaratskhelia (89. Östigard)
Attendance: 72.062
Goal: 0-1 Raspadori (65.)
The team:
Urs Fischer had acknowledged the trough his side had been in during his press conference on Monday, and here he looked to get on the front foot, having seen the damage done to Braga in the Olympiastadion three weeks ago as Union countered again and again, particularly in a first half that they dominated. He had clearly decided that pace here against the Italian champions would be crucial.
He had expressed worries about Robin Gosens, too, so it was reassuring to see him on the left of a back five replete with Diogo Leite, Robin Knoche, making his Champions League debut, and Danilho Doekhi in the middle, with captain, Christopher Trimmel on the right hand flank. Frederik Rönnow, as ever, was behind them in goal.
In midfield there was another debutant in Europe’s premier competition in Rani Khedira, with Janik Haberer and Brenden Aaronson whose experience belies his youth, with 10 Champions League games already under his belt.
But it was up top that Fischer wanted to lay down a marker, starting the excellent, and blisteringly fast pair of Sheraldo Becker – who got both during that first half against Braga – and David Datro Fofana.
That at the end he couldn’t fault any of them was devastating, for he had come out swinging.
Union control the half, Haberer’s effort ruled out for offside
After the final whistle of another heartbreaking, scolding Champions League game when his side played so well, only to go the long way back across Berlin empty handed, Fischer could only praise his team.
“It really looks like a lot is going against us at the moment,” he said. “My team did really well. The spacing was right, the aggression was there and we didn’t allow anything over 90 minutes, apart from one chance… The team did pretty much everything right for the entire match.”
And he was right. The superb Leite won the first challenge of the half, as he did the last, both times robbing the captain, Giovanni Di Lorenzo, and if there was anything that summed things up during the first 45 minutes, it was that. Union were excellent, but their flourishes up front were enabled by their diligence and intelligence at the back. Napoli flattered to deceive, but Union barely allowed them to play.
Leite, this time, passed simply to Fofana, his nudged little ball to Becker was perfectly weighted. And if Leite got the first tackle in, Haberer had the first shot. After only two minutes he jabbed at pace with little backlift wide if the near post. Union looked sharp, confident. Becker chesting down to Haberer, Khedira switching to Aaronson, Doekhi robbing Piotr Zielinski with the greatest of ease. Leite headed Trimmel’s corner just over with only five minutes gone.
And when Napoli won a free kick some 25 yards out with ten minutes played, it was all they could do to hammer it into the wall; when Jens Cajuste broke, Knoche shepherded him off the ball superbly.
Leite made another beautifully judged challenge in a performance full of them on Cajuste after quarter of an hour, stepping up the left-hand side, and releasing Becker. Despite everything, he has been in superb form all season long.
And if Union had a moment of worry, it was off the pitch as Becker made the long way around the newly red daubed running track towards the dugout, limping horribly. But he wasn’t going anywhere. He came straight back on, slapped his hamstrings to rouse himself, grimaced, shook his head and his shoulders and was immediately off again, searching to get on the end of one of those long balls that he so adores. As it was he who started the charge that led to Haberer pinging a volley wide after 20 minutes. He cut back cleverly to Aaronson after half an hour from the left, too, but the American clipped his shot well over the bar
When Union thought they had scored the opener, though, it came from the other side. Fofana danced and tricked his way past two stunned and static Napoli defenders before squaring to Haberer, whose emphatic finish was ruled out immediately by the linesman having spotted Fofana’s marginal offside in the build-up.
They still had to be careful though, for Napoli’s squad contains some wonderful players, even if they seemed to be struggling to recreate their glittering form of last year. Khedira nipped in just in time to stop a flowing Kvaratskhelia as he looked to open his body to shoot in the box, and Trimmel did well, stopping Zielinski as he looked to cut in from the left.
Gosens and Leite teamed up to stop Di Lorenzo on the right, but it was a superb tackle from Khedira on Giacomo Raspadori that stopped the Italian international shooting when he suddenly seemed to have time on the edge of the box that was the pick of the bunch.
Fofana saw his shot tipped just wide with ten minutes to play, having been played in again by the double-team of Khedira and Becker, up the middle this time, before Khedira flashed a shot across goal after Fofana had repaid the favour.
Union had used the ball well, and they’d caused Napoli some real problems with all that pace, but it had all been founded upon that display at the back, exemplified by the way Gosens and Leite took Di Lorenzo out of the game with a minute of time added on, knocking the ball to one another delicately, nullifying any threat, exuding calm.
Raspadori’s finish proves decisive. Union can’t break back
After Fofana robbed Stanislav Lobotka at the start of the half, one could have been forgiven for thinking that Union would continue their dominance over from the first half. And, largely, they did. He took a couple of touches and looked up, deciding to shoot this time, dragging it wide
But there was also a warning at the other end as Kvaraskhelia worked his first bit of magic, jinking past Doekhi. Knoche was there to get in the way of his shot this time, then Kvaratskhelia almost played Mateo Politano in after a moment of panic, but he overhit his pass when Knoche was scrambling to get back to his feet on the sodden pitch.
He would make up for his erring with a clever header out to Trimmel on the right who sprung Becker immediately. The ball wound its way to Fofana who tried an extravagant flick, but he couldn’t quite pull it off.
Things were getting tetchy as the referee allowed things to go on for an eternity as Khedira lay down on the pitch hurt, the play going on around him, but despite the tempers on the pitch Union seemed to have few worries.
But it is just then, of course, when an experienced side such as Napoli are at their most dangerous. Kvaratskhelia repeated his act, again hitting the byline, again his legs a blur, the ball again glued to his toe. He cut back no more than five yards or so to where Raspadori was loitering, his striker’s instincts having led him to drift into the slightest of gaps. He wouldn’t need another stab at it, burying his shot with his left foot.
It felt like the air was sucked out of this cavernous stadium for a moment, Union had been hoodwinked, and they struggled to compose themselves for a few minutes. Fischer reacted, bringing on Aissa Laidouni, Alex Kral and Kevin Behrens for Aaronson, Khedira and Fofana, but Napoli were now content to be patient, to wait on the ball, to knock it around without to much sense of purpose, and when Union had it, they looked heavy legged all of a sudden. But it wouldn’t last long. They shook themselves down.
They dragged themselves out of their torpor once again, a Trimmel cross flicked inches wide by the towering head of Behrens, and the crowd roused themselves a final time too.
But Napoli were wiley. They knew what they were doing, as when Mathias Olivera went down like he’d been shot on the edge of the box under Knoche’s attentions, or when Di Lorenzo did something similar when he and Laidouni went for the same ball in the box following Behrens’ deep swinging, volleyed cross. Di Lorenzo also dragged Becker all about, almost taking his shirt with him. The whistles from the huge crowd grew ever louder with every break in play.
Becker hit three crosses in a row as Union threw everything they had left at Napoli, but they were all cleared by either goalkeeper, Alex Meret or his defenders, thronging the box. Laidouni launched one in from the right, Gosens did so too.
But it just wasn’t enough in the end.
Fischer spoke of his pride at all his team had given, and he was echoed by his captain, Trimmel.
“I am convinced that if we continue like this, it is only a matter of time before we win again. If you perform like that against world-class teams like Napoli, you will eventually get the points again,” he said, his heart heavy, but his gaze still steely on the coming challenges.
Union had been undone by a single flash of inspiration from a side who had but a single significant chance and took it. They had been superb again, and they will take much from this. But sometimes the most important lessons are the ones that hurt the most.
