No way through as Fürth hold Freiburg

Fürth 0-0 Freiburg

Fürth may have been left nursing a 6-1 defeat by RB Leipzig last week, but they began this game with the confidence of a side that had won 13 of their 14 points this season on home turf prior to kick-off. It came as something of a surprise, then, when Freiburg had the first chance of the game, Roland Sallai with a stinging drive from the edge of the box that Andreas Linde tipped onto the post. The Clover Leaves pushed back though, and after Marco Meyerhöfer went close at the back post, Timothy Tillman had Fürth’s best chance of the half when released one-on-one with Mark Flekken by Jamie Leweling’s neat back-heeled flick, but the midfielder’s shot was blocked by the Freiburg goalkeeper. Vincenzo Grifo was thwarted by Linde at close range at the opposite end just before half-time, with the teams level at the break.

There was no such goalmouth action early in the second period, leading Freiburg head coach Christian Streich to bring on the Bundesliga’s 32-goal record supersub Nils Petersen from the bench. It was Jannik Harberer who went closest to breaking the deadlock though when he collected Sallai’s pass and lashed a shot at goal that crashed off the crossbar. Otherwise, however, both teams were largely restricted to efforts from distance, with Meyerhöfer curling an attempt just beyond the post with the pick of the bunch. As such, the match ended in a stalemate, and while the point may yet prove valuable to Fürth, the distance to outright safety grew from nine to 11 points following wins for both VfB Stuttgart and Hertha Berlin.

• Since January 2020, Freiburg have not won a game in which Nicolas Höfler has been absent (five draws, two defeats).
• Fürth are 11 points adrift of safety. No team has ever overturned such a deficit at this juncture in a campaign.
• Freiburg extended their unbeaten run to six games (three wins, three draws).
• This was the Black Forest club's fourth goalless draw of the season - more than any other team.
• The Clover Leaves drew 0-0 for the third time this campaign.

Fürth: Linde - Asta, Bauer, Viergever, Meyerhöfer - Christiansen, Griesbeck, Raschl (Seguin 71') - Tillman (Green 71') - Leweling (Nielsen 60'), Hrgota (c)
Unused subs: Burchert, Abiama, Willems, Fobassam Nawe
Out: Dudziak (Achilles), Funk (knee), Itter (not included), Jung (match fitness), Kehr (knee), Ngankam (knee), Pululu (not included)
Coach: Stefan Leitl 

Freiburg: Flekken - Schmid, Gulde, N. Schlotterbeck, Günter (c) - Eggestein, Haberer (Weißhaupt 83') - Sallai, Höler, Grifo - Demirovic (Petersen 58')
Unused subs: Uphoff, Siquet, Sidilla, K. Schlotterbeck, Engelhardt, Vermeij
Out: Keitel (broken toe), Kübler (muscular), Höfler (not included), Jeong (not included), Lienhart (not included), Schade (abdominals)
Coach: Christian Streich