22.04.2017 34 Match day of Regional League Southwest 1.FC Saarbrücken - SV Elversberg Hermann Neuberger Stadion Result 1:2 (1:0) Attendance: 4.607 (400 Guests)
Of all the five Regionalliga in Germany, the Southwest is by far the most thrilling one. It happened quite often that the three leading teams won or lost points during the same week, which was also the reason why no team could really run away from the others. So, with five weeks to go, the race to qualify for the promotion play-off was still quite open.
The derby between Saarbrücken and Elversberg, Saarland’s two biggest clubs, could decide who would qualify or not for the play-off. The situation before game was easy: If Saarbrücken won, they would be only three points behind Elversberg, who was second, with one game in hand. On the other hand, If Elversberg won the derby, they would be nine points ahead Saarbrücken with three games to go and a way better goal difference.
Before the game, we met up with friends at our local favourite pub and everyone was nervous. The mood was something like “expect the worst, so you won’t get disappointed”. Just in case you didn’t know – Elversberg hadn’t celebrated an away win yet in 2017.
Additionally, both top-scorers and many other players had to miss this game. We couldn’t really hide our worries when we only had a semi-reserve team to play against the Saarland giant, who just beat Mannheim last week?
Though we still tried to be positive while driving towards Völklingen, the current home ground of FC Saarbrücken. FCS’s home ground Ludwigspark is currently under construction, they have been playing at the neighour’s stadium for more than a year.
The construction project was funded by the city of Saarbrücken and the state government, who appointed people that were not expertised in stadium architecture or engineering. Soon after the construction started, some experts pointed out that the estimated budget was too low to build a new stadium.
In the end, both the city and the state government refused to pay the additional costs, which brought the construction to a halt. They demolished a really nice old school stadium before actually thinking if they could build a new one.
Because of the stadium chaos, FCS would have to to play longer at Völklingen’s Hermann-Neuberger-Stadion, where they originally only wanted to play for one year. The ground was built in the 1930s and the stands were built in a shape of a half moon. We found absolutely no beauty with only one and a half stands, where you couldn’t really see both fan sides at one side.
We arrived at the away block more than half hour before the game and it was already very crowded. In the end, there were about 400 away-fans, which was a really good turnout for a small club like Elversberg.
It felt like forever as we were waiting for the kick off, but soon the players finally entered the pitch. The guest pulled up their flags and greet the players, while the home block prepared a small choreo with blue and black flags and confetti.
The atmosphere in the away block was quite good in the beginning, but didn’t last long. We couldn’t see or hear the home fans at all, so we couldn’t comment on the FCS fans.
The game was one of the most thrilling ones of the season. Both teams started really good and Saarbrücken had the first chances, including a disallowed goal. Luck for Elversberg! However, Saarbrücken scored their deserved goal few minutes later, followed by another offside goal each for both teams.
The Elversberg fans became more quiet as they were not happy with the team’s performance. There was no effort in challenges or tackles, and many chances were wasted. Luckily, the first half went by really fast, so we had finally some time to relax and breathe.
The thrilling moments started after the second half resumed as Elversberg showed their class within two minutes: at 60th minute, midfield player Florian Bichler scored the equaliser through one-on-one; Only 90 seconds later, just when the fans were still bouncing and singing to celebrate the first goal, Julius Perstaller turned the game up for Elversberg! This guy. This guy only scored twice this season – both against Saarbrücken, and both time brought Elversberg 2:1.
We couldn’t really believe what just happened in front of our eyes. We also couldn’t believe what happened on the stands: almost everyone started chanting really loud for Elversberg, creating one of the best atmospheres the club ever had.
BUT! The game was not over yet. After all the excitement, the game became thrilling again. In the last twenty minutes, Elversberg were only defending as Saarbrücken tried their best to fight back, who knew that they had to win to keep their promotion dream alive.
The twenty minutes felt like three hours. But finally, the referee blew the whistle and marked the end of the game! Elversberg won the game.
The Elversberg players went to their fans and celebrated with them. When fans requested their team to be seated and celebreated with a “Humba”, the stadium started playing loud music. The players simply unplugged the speakers so they could concentrate on celebrating!
You could see pure joy in the eyes of everyone involved that day. It wasn’t just a derby victory, but also about the way that Elversberg showed how they could win a game out of nothing! Elversberg would now only need to win one point in the next three games to secure their place in the promotion play-off.
More pictures of the game here
After everything ended, we went back to the car and started driving home. We decided to have a relaxing weekend after this game so we could save some money.