The Kraichgauer team only managed a draw against Olympique Lyon.
TSG Hoffenheim, which has been stumbling for months, has suffered another setback in the fight to progress in the Europa League. The third-from-bottom team in the Bundesliga couldn’t get past a 2-2 (0-0) draw against Olympique Lyon on matchday 4 of the league phase.
The goals from Valentin Gendrey (47th) and Umut Tohumcu (90th + 6) were not enough for the Kraichgauer team to win. The Brazilian Abner (66th) and Alexandre Lacazette (90th + 4) scored for Lyon. Hoffenheim have a meager five points. In the last five competitive games, TSG only managed a narrow victory in the DFB Cup (2-1) against 1. FC Nürnberg. On Sunday there is an extremely important league game for coach Pellegrino Matarazzo’s team at FC Augsburg.
“It’s clear that we have Augsburg in mind,” said Matarazzo before the game: “But we’re not giving away any competition.”
The Hoffenheim team got off to a good start in front of 18,227 spectators in Sinsheim. It was clearly noticeable to the guests that numerous regular players were rested with a view to the derby in the domestic league on Sunday against AS Saint-Etienne. Nevertheless, Georges Mikautadze had a first good opportunity with a header for Lyon (9th).
On the other hand, TSG star striker Andrej Kramaric caused danger (11th). The Croatian knows Lyon very well. The attacker scored a total of three goals in the two duels in the 2018 Champions League (3:3 and 2:2).
After Kramaric’s opportunity, not much happened. It wasn’t until the 29th minute that Hoffenheim’s U17 world champion Max Moerstedt missed another chance. Shortly before the break it was Kramaric who once again set an offensive tone (43′).
Right at the start of the second round, Gendrey broke the spell. Moerstedt could have added more (53′), but narrowly missed. Lyon then increased the number of strikes and pushed for an equalizer. After an hour, the guests brought in three regular players, and Abner’s goal came as no surprise. In the final phase it was very exciting.
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