The Wolves kicked off the new 2022/23 Bundesliga season with a 2-2 draw at home to promoted outfit Werder Bremen. Niko Kovac’s charges took an early lead through Lukas Nmecha (11′) but two quickfire goals from the visitors via Niklas Füllkrug (21′) and Leonardo Bittencourt (23′) gave Bremen a deserved half-time lead. Substitute Josuha Guilavogui netted the all-important equaliser in the 84th minute to salvage a point for a Green-and-White side that struggled to click into gear overall.
The Wolves are next in action on Sunday 14 August (kick-off 17:30 CEST) away to reigning champions Bayern Munich on Bundesliga Matchday 2.
Niko Kovac: “We saw two different halves today, especially in terms of our own game. We had a lot of defensive shortcomings in the first half, but going forward we did a couple of things we’ve been working on. The goal we scored through Lukas and the chance we created after that were ok, but defensively it wasn’t good at all. Bringing on Josh in the second half gave us some stability. I’ll take the 2-2 draw because Werder Bremen really played very well in the first half, even if they couldn’t keep it up in the second period. But we were also much better after the break.”
Ole Werner: “We’ve got mixed feelings after that game. Before kick-off we’d have said that a 2-2 draw away to VfL Wolfsburg is a decent result, and I think our performance over the 90 minutes was really good. It was a performance that not only gives us confidence going into our upcoming games, but also showed that we can compete in this league with our style of play – as long as we always push ourselves to the limit.”
VfL Wolfsburg: Casteels – Baku (75‘ Kruse), Bornauw, Lacroix, van de Ven – Svanberg (46’ Guilavogui), Arnold – Wimmer (67‘ Waldschmidt), Marmoush (67’ Kaminski), Brekalo (56’ Wind) – L. Nmecha
Subs: Pervan (GK), Franjic, Otavio, Vranckx
SV Werder Bremen: Pavlenka – Pieper, Veljkovic, Friedl – Groß, Jung (69‘ Buchanan), Weiser (75‘ Agu), Bittencourt (75’ Rapp), Stage – Ducksch, Füllkrug (79’ Burke)
Subs: Zetterer (GK), Stark, Schmidt, Gruev, Woltemade
Goals: 1-0 L. Nmecha (11’), 1-1 Füllkrug (21’), 1-2 Bittencourt (23’), 2-2 Guilavogui (84’)
Yellow cards: van de Ven, L. Nmecha / Weiser, Pieper
Referee: Sascha Stegemann (Niederkassel)
Attendance: 28,015 at Volkswagen Arena