Stuttgart Vs. Freiburg: Flum’s First-Half Strike The Difference

Freiburg compounded Stuttgart’s problems near the bottom of the table by holding on to their first-half lead to send the home side down to a twelfth defeat of the season. Bruno Labbadia’s team were a bit more aggressive and dangerous in the second half, but failed to capitalize on the few chances they created.

There was just one change at halftime, as Timo Gebhart replaced Daniel Didavi for Stuttgart. Pavel Pogrebnyak had the first chance of the second half, heading wide from a Christian Molinaro cross three minutes after the interval. The Russian striker was again the centre of attention on fifty-eight minutes as Oliver Barth accidentally kicked Pogrebnyak in the head while clearing the ball in the penalty area. Labbadia saw that his side were not causing Freiburg enough problems, and made a pair of very attacking substitutions in the last half-hour; Martin Harnik and Sven Schipplock came on for Patrick Funk and Ciprian Marica, respectively.

After controlling the ball but failing to capitalize on it for most of the second half, home side thought they had a penalty in the eighty-first minute. Timo Gebhart’s shot appeared to hit Oliver Barth’s elbow, but the referee, Jochen Drees, was not interested. Stuttgart’s best chance of the match came two minutes from time as Christian Gentner whipped the ball in from the right corner of the penalty area towards the near post. Oliver Baumann came for the ball but spilled it at the feet of Martin Harnik, who had an open goal to shoot at from the right edge of the six-yard box, but could only hit the post.

The defeat leaves Stuttgart in seventeenth, six points from safety, while Freiburg remain in sixth, but move to just one point behind fifth-placed Hannover 96.