SC Freiburg finished the group stage in the Europa League undefeated. At Qarabag Agdam, however, the Bundesliga team missed their fifth win in six games. Despite being outnumbered, the Freiburgers, who are happy to change, still concede the equalizer.
SC Freiburg remains undefeated despite a large rotation in the Europa League. Without regular players like Michael Gregoritsch and goalkeeper Mark Flekken, coach Christian Streich’s team came to a 1-1 (1-0) draw in the last group game at Qarabag Agdam from Azerbaijan, which was meaningless for the Breisgau team, and finished Group G with 14 points.
Nils Petersen (25./penalty kick) scored the very flattering Freiburg lead, Kwabena Owusu (90.2) managed to equalize late with a man down. Agdam’s Kevin Medina (62nd) saw the red card after a serious foul on Kevin Schade. Freiburg, who are unbeaten in five games in all competitions, had already won their group and qualified for the round of 16 last week. In the intermediate round, the runners-up meet the Champions League relegated team.
While Freiburg, who started with ten new players, initially had to find each other, the hosts were more aggressive in the duels and immediately took control of the game. It took almost twenty minutes for Freiburg to calm down the game a bit. Almost out of nowhere, the guests even took the lead: After a long ball, Kevin Schade was almost through, but was rigorously stopped by Agdam’s Bahlul Mustafazada. Petersen coldly converted the penalty due (25′).
With the lead behind them, Freiburg withdrew again, but Agdam was rarely able to create promising chances (32’/39′). After the break, the people of Breisgau had several moments of shock: First, the video referee conceded a penalty for Agdam for offside (52nd), two minutes later the VAR took back the supposed equalizer by Marko Vesovic, also for offside. In addition, Medina was sent off after a tough foul game.
As a result, Agdam continued to push for an equalizer, but Freiburg, who were challenged again on Sunday in the Bundesliga against 1. FC Köln (5.30 p.m. / DAZN and in the live ticker on ntv.de), were defensively stable – but only until for the second minute of stoppage time.
