After a mediocre opening to the second half, Schalke 04 and Mainz 05 threw almost everything at each other for the last twenty minutes at the Stadion am Bruchweg, but it wasn’t enough for the hosts, who slipped to a fourth loss in six matches. Thomas Tuchel rolled the dice with a half-hour to go, making a trio of substitutions -- Lewis Holtby, Adam Szalai, and Marco Caligiuri were introduced for Marcel Risse, Elkin Soto, and Andreas Ivanschitz.
Manuel Neuer Penalty Save Secures Victory For Schalke 04
After some initial shakiness, Mainz settled down in the last quarter of the match and perhaps deserved an equalizer. They were presented with the perfect chance to level the match as Manuel Neuer took Szalai down in the box. Felix Brych pointed to the spot again, but didn’t even book the German number one, even though he may have denied a clear goalscoring opportunity. Lewis Holtby stepped up to take the penalty, but Neuer parried his poor shot. A mis-kicked clearance from Astuto Uchida dropped to Szalai, but he could only hit the crossbar.
Brych was the centre of attention for much of the last twenty minutes, as Mainz felt he should have given them a number of fouls in addition to his leniency with Neuer. However, Schalke survived the late pressure to record a third straight win in all competitions. The victory moves them up to tenth in the table, their highest league position this season. Mainz remain in fourth, two points behind second-place Bayer Leverkusen and thirteen in arrears of leaders Borussia Dortmund.
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