Have the VBL experts massively underestimated 1. FC Magdeburg and SV Darmstadt 98? That’s what it looks like at the moment, with the two underdogs causing a stir in the German club championship.
“Müssen loslassen” (English: ‘Have to let go’) is how the hosts Mohammed ‘MoAuba’ Harkous and Tim ‘Latka’ Schwartmann christened the lowest category of their tier lists before the start of the season. The predictions for the teams and their performances in the VBL Club Championship (VBLCC) were shown – with none other than title holder Jonas Wirth as a guest. The trio ranked the clubs according to their expectations for the upcoming season. And they didn’t hold back.
Seven teams ended up in “must let go” across all divisions. This means that the experts gave them little chance of making the playoffs. Most of these clubs have indeed had a difficult start to the new season so far – but two stand out. 1. FC Magdeburg and SV Darmstadt 98 marched through the VBLCC on the first four matchdays instead of serving as point suppliers.
“Two wonderful nights at the top of the table”
Magdeburg got their third win on Tuesday – they haven’t lost yet. Against FC Schalke 04, Muhammed Ali Gencer and Onur Can Polat impressed, especially in 2v2: after 26 in-game minutes, they were already leading 3-0, and in the end it was 4-2. “Insanely good” is how Gencer described his own double in the aftermath on Twitch, while teammate Polat thought it was “perfect”. Which cannot be said of the subsequent single.
Gencer, aka ‘AliiiG07’, was 2-0 down to Schalke’s Bastian Rupsch at the break. “I had zero shots on target at half-time – something that’s never happened to me before,” said the FCM pro afterwards. “I couldn’t get a single decent attack together.” Before the break, one of Magdeburg’s players found the right words: “Thanks to my coach, without him I wouldn’t have turned it around. He talked to me the whole half-time break.”
With an enormous improvement in performance, Gencer managed the comeback in the second half to beat S04 4-2 in a speed run. The Magdeburg team jumped to first place in the North-West Division with ten points.
The host of the club stream was happy about “two nice nights at the top of the table”. FCM e-sportsman Richard Schulz hoped for “seven nice nights”. But that didn’t happen: BVB took first place again on Thursday.
From the bottom of the barrel to “surprises”
Darmstadt was also temporarily at the top in Division South-East. The Lilies had to let co-favorites FC Bayern Munich and 1. FC Kaiserslautern pass them in the table. Nevertheless, third place is much more than they were expected to achieve before the start of the season.
On Wednesday, the Hessians defeated TSG Hoffenheim, who had not yet lost a point, and overtook the Kraichgau team – although the 2vs2 was lost 0-2.
“Individual mistakes” and ‘unused chances’ were the reasons given by Kaan Tuncer on Instagram for the opening defeat. Teammate Nassim Dahman then had to keep the chance of winning alive – but got off to a terrible start. He fell behind 0-2 against Hoffenheim’s Fabrice Weiß, but then showed great spirit: ‘Nassada-‘ turned the game around in the second half with three goals in just eleven in-game minutes.
This is how Tuncer got the controller back. With the chance to give his SVD its third win of the season. A wild exchange of blows developed against TSG pro Aymane Mokallik: 2-0, 2-2, 5-2, 5-4 – in the last few in-game minutes, ‘xKaan61_’ increased the lead to 7-4 against his onslaughing opponent. Tuncer was “pushed in” at the back at the end. He made clinical use of the spaces that opened up to make the decisive goal.
In the Thursday Twitch review, the Darmstadt team was praised by the VBL couch. “I’ve already trained with Nassim and Kaan. They’re really good,” said Karlsruhe e-sportsman and show guest Denis Müller on the livestream. The hosts were particularly impressed by the Lilies’ offense. “Darmstadt is the biggest surprise for me,” said ‘Tim Latka’. ‘Similar to Magdeburg in the other division.’ So much for the category ‘let go’.
You can find all the results and standings of the VBL Club Championship in our overview.
