ADMIRAL Bundesliga Matchday 20 Review

SV Guntamatic Ried 1-3 FK Austria Vienna

New Ried Manager Maximilian Senft got off to a great start in his first game in charge, only for things to fall apart after the break as Austria Vienna took a step closer to the Championship Round. Stefan Nutz opened the scoring for the hosts after 22 minutes as he curled in directly from the corner spot, and Marvin Martins couldn’t clear from the goal line. The last time a Bundesliga goal came directly from a corner it was against Ried, three years ago! Nutz also recorded his 29th goal involvement in the Bundesliga for the hosts, more than anyone else at the club since the return to the top flight in 2020. However, just after the half-hour mark, Austria’s in-form forward Haris Tabakovic lashed in a confident finish from the right for his fifth goal of 2023, before a red card for Ried’s David Ungar left the Violets with a numerical advantage for the second half. They made the most of it as an own goal came from the head of Julian Turi, before Andreas Gruber fired in a third from a loose ball in the box to make it 3-1 to the guests late on. Senft will have seen some positives from Ried’s display, but they remain at the bottom of the table, as Austria moved into fifth place at a crucial period of the season.

SC Austria Lustenau 0-2 SK Puntigamer Sturm Graz

Lustenau lost any chance of reaching the Championship Round, as another resilient defensive showing wasn’t enough to take points off a persistent Sturm side on Saturday. In a first half low on chances, the effective Alexander Prass set up two good opportunities with crosses for Emanuel Emegha shortly before the break, but both ended up wide of the target for the away team. Stefano Surdanovic won a game-high 16 challenges for the hosts, and his combative display saw his head bandaged after a collision; he went close for Lustenau too, but he couldn’t turn home a bouncing ball at the back post. Seven minutes after the restart, Sturm’s surprise goal hero of 2023 struck again in the box. Several shots were bravely blocked, but defender David Affengruber remained calm and slotted through the crowd to break the deadlock with his fourth career league goal, and his third of the calendar year. Lustenau tried hard to respond, but with the visitors finding ever more space on the counter, Prass set up a one-on-one for Emegha which also went wide, before Manprit Sarkaria laid the ball off to Tomi Horvat in the box, where he blasted in off the underside of the bar to double the lead after 76 minutes. Sarkaria was involved in a goal for the fourth straight game, and Sturm even had the ball in the net twice more, but both “goals” were rightly chalked off, leaving the scoreline at 2-0 to the team in second place. Sturm picked up a third win from four games, as eighth-placed Lustenau fell to a third defeat from four.

TSV Egger Glas Hartberg 2-1 RZ Pellets WAC

Hartberg enjoyed a first home win since August 2022, as WAC’s costly loss saw them miss out on the Championship Group, and led to the dismissal of manager Robin Dutt. Dominik Prokop ran on to the end of a Dario Tadic pass and prodded home his first goal for Hartberg 16 minutes in, celebrating his first Bundesliga strike since May 2019, when he scored for ex-club Austria Vienna. Dominik Frieser thought he’d added a second for a home team who were playing with their tails up, but that was ruled out for offside, and WAC then struck back thanks to Tai Baribo’s spot kick after a hand-ball was well-spotted by VAR. Baribo took his tally to 12 for the season with his equaliser, one more than he managed last year, and he continued his run of scoring in every game in 2023 for Wolfsberg. However, Raphael Sallinger made a good stop to deny Thorsten Röcher in the second half, and Hartberg went in search of a goal of their own, which came in the 90th minute when Thomas Rotter chipped a well-weighted pass above the defence for Ruben Providence to loft over Wolfsberg’s replacement keeper David Skubl. It was a top-class winning goal - a second of the season for Providence - and there were jubilant scenes at the Profertil Arena as the Styrian side claimed a rare victory after five defeats and a draw in their last six on home turf. They move up to tenth, three points off the bottom, and three behind WAC in ninth.

SK Austria Klagenfurt 3-0 CASHPOINT SCR Altach

Klagenfurt remain right in the running for a top-six berth after brushing aside Altach with a blistering first half performance. Top scorer Markus Pink tapped in a Rico Benatelli pass after just seven minutes, but the would-be assist provider was offside, however the hosts would take just seven more minutes to make one count. Florian Rieder, returning after being left out for the last game, finished off a strange passage of play as Altach’s keeper delayed his clearance too long, Simon Straudi blocked it onto the bar with a header, and Rieder tucked in the rebound. In his 104th Bundesliga appearance, Rieder even got his first brace, firing in a lovely low shot from the left after more passive defending for his fourth goal of the season - more than he’s ever managed in a previous campaign. Pink wouldn’t be left out though, as he nodded home a powerful Till Schumacher cross to get his 14th of the season, re-establishing his lead in the race for the Bundesliga’s ‘Golden Boot’. At 3-0 after just 33 minutes, the contest was close to being done and dusted. Altach created a couple of half chances for Husein Balic, but on the whole Klagenfurt were closer to making it 4-0, especially when Christoper Cvetko saw a shot come back off the post. The comfortable home win keeps Klagenfurt within one point of sixth place, as Altach drop to 11th and remain goalless after four games in 2023, just as they were at the same stage in 2022.

WSG Tirol 2-3 LASK

A second successive late winner gave LASK another three points from a thrilling game in Innsbruck, as WSG missed the chance to go fourth. In his third Bundesliga game, Ibrahim Mustapha scored his first goal when Sascha Horvath’s ball over the top was lobbed into the back of the WSG net after 22 minutes. The game was tight, but LASK doubled their lead when Mustapha dropped the ball off in the D for Keito Nakamura, who picked out the bottom corner with his 11th goal of the campaign 12 minutes later. The Tyroleans are in the top six for a reason though, and after Justin Forst had hit the post, his overhead kick then pulled one back with style for the home team just before the break. Only a minute after the interval, the guests failed to clear, and Valentino Müller levelled up at 2-2 with a precise low shot - his third goal of the season is as many as he’s scored in five seasons combined before this one. The momentum was then with the hosts until Felix Bacher was dismissed with a second yellow card after 53 minutes, and although they battled hard to hold on to the draw, keeper Ferdinand Oswald was finally beaten in stoppage time. Nakamura fired a ball in from the left, where Robert Zulj steered it just over the goal line to seal the win for LASK. Nakamura recorded a 15th goal contribution of the season (11 goals, 4 assists), more than double the seven he had last year, as the Linzers remain in a league of their own in third place. WSG fell to sixth spot, just a point above seventh with two regular season fixtures still to come.

SK Rapid Vienna 2-4 FC Red Bull Salzburg

Salzburg got past a stubborn Rapid in a spectacular Sunday evening game, as a late hat-trick from substitute Benjamin Sesko broke the hearts of 24,000 fans in Hütteldorf. The guests got off to the ideal start when Andreas Ulmer - on his landmark 400th Bundesliga appearance - delivered a low cross for Nicolas Seiwald to slot in with just four minutes on the clock, but Rapid would hit back before the break when Bernhard Zimmermann slid in to score from a Marco Grüll delivery. The game was then a hard fought contest, and it was only in the closing stages that the key moments came. Philipp Köhn produced a stunning double save to keep Guido Burgstaller’s header out of the bottom corner, and he got back up to block Grüll’s rebound effort, too. With Rapid reeling from the miss, Sesko came to the fore as the ball bounced kindly for him in the box on the 80 minute mark, he scuffed his finish but found the net, before breaking away and firing coolly into the far corner four minutes later. He danced past defenders in the area to make it 4-1 after 88 minutes, and in doing so he became just the third player to score a hat-trick in the final 15 minutes of a Bundesliga game, following in the footsteps of Hans Krankl (1988) and Christopher Trimmel (2009). Jonas Auer then crossed for Rapid striker Burgstaller to head in goal number 12 of the season with the last move of the match, but the game had slipped away from the hosts in the final phase. Salzburg stay nine points ahead of Sturm at the summit, but fourth-placed Rapid could now face a nervous few weeks as they’re not yet secure in the Championship Round, and they play two direct rivals in WSG and Austria Vienna in their next two games.

Redakteur: The Other Bundesliga

Fotos: GEPA pictures