Football United

The Wolves returned to winning ways by emphatically beating VfL Bochum 3-0 in the VOLKSWAGENARENA in round 9 of the Bundesliga on Saturday afternoon (23.10.04). All of the goals came in the first half. Pablo Thiam opened the scoring on 27 minutes, further goals followed as first Klimowicz struck on 40 minutes and then D'Alessandro made the score 3-0 to the Wolves just before the break.

Only one change
The home coach Erik Gerets made only one change to the side which lost 0-3 away to Hanover last time out. Skipper Stefan Schnoor replaced the suspended Kevin Hofland (5 yellow cards) in the starting line-up.

Wolves on top
The home side took the initiative from the off, putting Bochum under early pressure. Andres D’Alessandro missed two gilt-edged opportunities within the first 15 minutes. Bochum started to become more involved towards the middle of the first half and created two half chances for Lokvenc and Madsen respectively. During that spell of Bochum pressure, Wolfsburg struck to take the lead. On 27 minutes Pablo Thiam saw the ball rebound off his back and into the net.

Two goals in as many minutes
That setback visibly shook the visiting side and the Wolves imposed their superiority so much that the home side were creating chances at will. Karhan thought he’d scored with a free kick, but the referee called the play back because he hadn’t released the ball. Klimowicz however put the Wolves two goals up as he followed up a shot by Brdaric. Two minutes later the Argentinean midfield general Andres D’Alessandro scored with his weaker right foot, to give the Wolves a deserved three goal half time lead.

Neururer throws caution to the wind
The Bochum coach Peter Neururer had nothing to lose anymore and introduced Trojan, Misimovic and Bechmann at the start of the second half. The Wolves didn’t create as many chances as they had during the first half, but that was mainly because of their inability to use the space given to them by Bochum. Bochum scored a perfectly good goal as Trojan struck, but the referee disallowed it for offside.

Table toppers again
So the Wolves return to the toip of the Bundesliga table, at least until tomorrow…Stuttgart face Freiburg on Sunday. A win for coach Matthias Sammer’s side would put Stuttgart back at the top.

WOLFSBURG: Jentzsch; Rytter (Franz, 83'), Quiroga, Schnoor, Weiser; Karhan, Thiam; D'Alessandro (Sarpei, 80'); Brdaric, Klimowicz (Topic, 78'), M. Petrov.

BOCHUM: van Duijnhoven; Colding, Kalla, Matip (Misimovic, 46'), P. Bönig; Zdebel, Maltritz, Wosz; Preuß (Bechmann, 46'), Lokvenc (Trojan, 46'), P. Madsen.

GOALS: 1-0, Thiam (27'); 2-0, Klimowicz (40'); 3-0, D'Alessandro (42')

Source: vfl-wolfsburg.de