02.12.2018

Commitment and a desire to win

HSV remain unbeaten under new manager Hannes Wolf with five wins and one draw in his first six games. The head coach spoke the day after the win in Ingolstadt about the atmosphere amongst the squad, which has helped put HSV on such a good run of form.

Review

In the end it was a close scoreline but the 2-1 win at FC Ingolstadt helped HSV defend their lead at the top of the table. Despite dominating the game for long periods, Ingolstadt came back into the game with a header just after half time. Hannes Wolf explained the day after the game what things he learned from the game and what to expect from the next game on Friday night. In the interview, Hannes Wolf spoke

about…

…the 2-1 win in Ingolstadt:

We scored two goals in the last game against Union Berlin and Bakery Jatta was also unlucky with his shot that hit the bar. This is good to see especially with Pierre-Michel Lasogga out injured. The team also defended well as Ingolstadt only really created one chance coming in the last minute. We definitely need to defend better from set pieces and long balls. We had problems against Ingolstadt but we definitely deserved the win. Statistics show that when the league leaders play against the team bottom they only win 50% of the time, therefore we are delighted to have got the three points.

…the goalscorers Hunt and Hwang:

The way the Ingolstadt players acted towards Hwang was very unsporting at times. He took the challenge head on and battled throughout the whole game and worked so hard for the team. That was important. It was even better that he managed to make it 2-0 especially because he has the responsibility to score goals as the striker. Aaron showed once again how important he is for us. The opponents tried to snuff him out but he came out on top. He scored our first goal against Union and he did it once again against Ingolstadt. That is not a coincidence.

…being top of the league:

You can feel the positivity surrounding the club. We are brimming with confidence and the lads are playing well because of it. Despite this, we still go into every game with great respect for our opponents. You cannot stroll to a victory in this league and walk to promotion. You need to play at your absolute best. Nothing will be handed to us on a plate; in fact it is the complete opposite. We need to put everything into every game. It is not as simple as just pressing a button, the players need to know their roles and have intensity every day. We need to keep working every single week.

…the game on Friday evening against SC Paderborn:

This is the next tough test for us. Paderborn have a really good team, especially going forward. They have scored the second most goals in the league this season. We will prepare as well as we can so we are raring to go on Friday. You can feel the desire to win amongst the lads. They have developed a real winning mentality of the past few weeks. We need to show this once again against Paderborn to back up the two decent home results against Köln and Union Berlin.

No show from HSV

HSV head coach Markus Gisdol was forced into changing his team ahead of the trip south. Long term injured first choice keeper Adler was still recovering from a broken rib before his understudy Mathenia also got injured and was ruled out of the matchday 31 encounter. Up stepped under-21 stopper Mikel to the fray. Key winger Kostic who scored the only goal of the game between the two sides on matchday 14 was suspended so his place went to Austrian Gregoritsch. Ostrzolek got the nod at left back ahead of Douglas Santos while Walace replaced Jung in defensive midfield. Gisdol made four changes in all to the side which lost 1-2 at home to relegation certainties Darmstadt last time out. The new-look formation struggled early on. Augsburg created three top scoring opportunities within the opening 20 minutes. New keeper Mikel managed to keep out efforts by Kohr and Schmid and was grateful to be able to watch a Stafylidis free kick fizz narrowly wide of target. On 22 minutes the visitors were in luck again as an Altintop effort struck the left hand post with Mikel beaten. It seemed to the capacity crowd including yet another sold out contingent of travelling HSV faithful that it weould only be a matter of time before the home side would break the deadlock and they did as Altintop rounded off two counter attacks on 28 and 41 minutes to make the halftime score 2-0 to Augsburg. Mickel was powerless on both occasions and was HSV’s best man before the break.

Deserved defeat

Lasogga came on for Gregoritsch and Jung replaced Walace at the start of the second half as Gisdol opted for a two-pronged attack. Later Jatta replaced Ostrzolek. The ploy simply didn’t work as the Rothosen had more of the ball than in the previous half but were completely harmless in front of goal. Augsburg played a much more intelligent game and struck the woodwork again through Baier. That superior intelligence was underlined late on as Augsburg struck twice through Max and substitute Bobadilla (76., 85.). It was game over for HSV who failed to threaten until the 84th minute for Lasogga and Wood to miss chances. It was simply not good enough and the Rothosen remain just one point above the relegation play off spot in the table. Matchday 22 sees Gisdol and Co. host Mainz who are level on points but two places better due to a superior goal difference. Only a win will do as the teams lock horns at the Volksparkstadion in Hamburg next Sunday (07.05.17, 3.30 PM).

Match details:

FC Augsburg:

Hitz - Verhaegh, Gouweleeuw, Hinteregger, Stafylidis - Kohr, D. Baier (88. Callsen-Bracker) - Schmid, Halil Altintop (80. Bobadilla), Max (87. Ji) - Finnbogason

HSV:

Mickel - Diekmeier, K. Papadopoulos, Mavraj, Ostrzolek (63. Jatta) - Sakai, Walace (46. Jung) - Gregoritsch (46. Lasogga), Holtby, Hunt - Wood

Goals:

1:0 Altintop (28.), 2:0 Altintop (41.), 3:0 Max (76.), 4:0 Bobadilla (85.)

Booked:

Baier (48.) / Mavraj (33.), Gregoritsch (44.), Ostrzolek (51.), Holtby (72.)

Referee:

Manuel Gräfe (Berlin)

Att:

30.660 (sold out)