A loss is a loss

Time has shown that – contrary to several stereotypes about football players claiming they're not the most intelligent people on earth – the huge fields of sports and philosophy are closer together than expected. Nearly everyone knows a quote from George Best who stated „I spent a lot of my money on booze, birds and fast cars - the rest I just squandered.“.

But football does not only have its own philosophers but also special philosophies.The FC St. Pauli is a good example to illustrate this: The philosophy of being different and unique is obvious and seems to be so important that football sometimes becomes just a sidenote. But since Jürgen Klopp is in response of our team, we also have a philosophy- young players, high effort, pressing. Resulting from this style of play our derbywinning and successful team was accompanied by self-esteem on their journey to Hamburg.

Another very positive philosophy which is established in our beautiful Westfalenstadion was taken over by St. Pauli- no restrictions of fan materials besides pyro. The crowd glared in the most beautiful colours and many flags were waved- possibly for the last time in the upcoming 5 years. In the beginning of the match smoke ascended from the guest crowd which was a breach of trust and we'll see to which extent St. Pauli will restrict our fans in the future.

The match started quite balanced in the first few minutes without scenes worth mentioning. The first 15 minutes were played when St. Pauli seemed to become better- but then it happened: The all-over-yellow Dortmund team stopped an enemy attack, carried the ball in direction of the goal and after a very nice interaction of Barrios and Kagawa it was „Dortmunder Jung“ Kevin Großkreutz who scored the goal with his head from closest distance after „Kagawa Shinji“ ran to the endline and flanked the ball in. As stated before St. Pauli increased their efforts before the goal and afterwards they invested even more which caused a very well-played attack which resulted in the 1:1 after 24 minutes played. But not enough the Kiez-team continued to attack and thanks to their inconsequence and inaccuracy Klopps team could respire in the half-time break.

The 2nd halftime started like the 1st has ended and so St. Pauli tried to score an early goal, but in the 47th minute Weidenfeller saved fantastically and Paulis striker failed to use the rebound. Here comes another wisdom- if you don't use your own chances you will get punished and this is what happened in the 50th minute when Barrios proved his class after he caught up a misdirected pass from Pauli, pulled the defenders to him who were unable to stop him. The following pass came to Götze who ran to the endline and passed the ball in the backs of the remaining defenders to Kagawa who scored the lead once again. 10 minutes later on our midfield genius Nuri Sahin tried it from the second row- and hit the goalpost. It's simply unbelievable how often shots from our team just hit the goalpost or the crossbar. But the action wasn't over yet although a defender cleared. After a throw- in from Schmelzer and another clearing the ball again came after playing from behind to Barrios who just shot from out of the penalty area. Kessler tried to catch the ball but he couldn't and Kevin Großkreutz saw and took the chance to score his 2nd goal- 1:3 for the team who was and is 2nd in the Bundesliga.

St. Pauli didn't give up and in the 68th minute our special friend Gerald Asimoah came in to revive the more or less clueless offensive of the „alternative club“ who mostly tried to use very early flanks and/or high passes to endanger our defense. But again it was Dortmund with Lewandowski who had the chance to expand the lead but he wasn't able to score his 3rd goal in a row as a joker. The match went on without remarkable scenes besides a meeting of Weidenfeller and an unlikeable striker who came from Scheisse to Pauli for 2 years which revealed tensions from the past.

All in all our young team proved to be able to win even difficult matches and the ability to speed up if needed as well as the ability of using just a few chances. Good job guys!
Well, another proof was also given: A loss is a loss- even if your club seems to be different from the „normal rules“ of the football world.

Statistics

FC St. Pauli: Kessler - Rothenbach, Gunesch, Thorandt, Oczipka - Lehmann - Bruns, Takyi, Ebbers, Bartels - Hennings.

Borussia Dortmund: Weidenfeller – Owomoyela, Subotic, Hummels, Schmelzer – Bender , Sahin – Götze, Kagawa, Großkreutz – Barrios.

Substitutions: 63. Kruse for Oczipka, 68. Asimoah for Takyi, 84. Schultz for Hennings - 70. Lewandowski for Kagawa, 78. Kuba for Barrios, 85. Feulner for Großkreutz

Goals: 0:1 Großkreutz (17., Kagawa), 1:1 Hennings (25., Bartels), 1:2 Kagawa (50., Götze), 1:3 Großkreutz (60., Barrios).

Corners: 8:3 (4:1 in the first half)

Referee: Stark (Ergolding)

Attendance: 24.082 (sold out)

Zar'roc, 26.09.2010