Schalke 04 missed out on making up ground on the promotion places against St. Pauli. Those involved blamed the first half for this.
The premiere for Schalke’s co-trainer Sven Piepenbrock was a failure. In the 1:2 loss at FC St. Pauli, the 39-year-old blamed passivity in the first half.
Defending before conceding the first goal was decisive
“We could have defended the first goal much better,” Piepenbrock said on Sky, citing the 0:1 by former Schalke player Guido Burgstaller as a negative example. Thomas Ouwejan lacked commitment in the duel. Burgstaller himself – who was praised by Schalke keeper Martin Fraisl – said after the final whistle that he had shielded the ball exactly “so that he either fouls me or I have my body in front of him”.
The latter succeeded, as we all know, and S04 also lacked a few other things before the interval whistle. Goalkeeper Fraisl said about “the expected difficult game”: “In the first half, the opponent managed to cut us off, to put his stamp on us.” Schalke themselves would have taken an active part in the game too late. The Austrian did not want to make excuses despite the situation.
Co-coach Piepenbrock, who deputised for Schalke’s Coach Dimitrios Grammozis late on Saturday night in the top match at FC St. Pauli due to a positive COVID-19 finding of the Greek, had no choice but to agree with his goalkeeper Fraisl in the end. The late substitution of the jokers would have been a breath of fresh air, but after ex-Kiez kicker Rodrigo Zalazar’s follow-up goal at the beginning of the final phase, there was too little compelling attacking play – as was the case elsewhere in the game.
Piepenbrock’s changes at the break (“When in possession, move the full-backs forward against the ball to put a bit more pressure on them”) were not enough to equalise in the end, partly because Ouwejan only scored from an offside position. Fraisl, who had a lot of praise for his compatriot Burgstaller, could only say: “We showed character, you could see that in the second half – but it wasn’t enough.
