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Wolfsburg (AP) - VfL Wolfsburg celebrates Christmas despite five short-term quarantine cases on a Champions League place.
Weakened in this way, it was still enough for the “Wolves” in the last Bundesliga game of the year to win a 1-0 (0-0) win against the recently strong VfB Stuttgart.
With a free kick from Josip Brekalo (50th minute), VfL passed Union Berlin and Borussia Dortmund in the table on Sunday.
The in itself harmless shot of the Croatian was deflected by two Stuttgarters.
The Wolfsburg only announced two hours before kick-off that five players had already been quarantined the day before.
Maximilian Arnold and Jerome Roussillon tested positive for the coronavirus, Maximilian Philipp, Xaver Schlager and Tim Siersleben were classified as direct contact persons.
After consulting the health department, the trio went into domestic isolation as a precaution.
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Coach Oliver Glasner cannot explain this accumulation of corona cases at VfL.
«We have a strict hygiene concept here.
We test a lot and the players stick to it very closely, ”he said in an interview with Sky.
In the past weeks and months the players Kevin Mbabu, Josip Brekalo, Renato Steffen and Marin Pongracic had already tested positive.
In response to the many failures, Glasner had to offer everything in the central midfield that his 29-man squad still had in terms of alternatives.
Captain Josuha Guilavogui and the former U21 national player Yannick Gerhardt replaced the Wolfsburg power center Arnold / Schlager.
19-year-old Pole Bartosz Bialek made his starting line-up debut as a hanging tip.
Despite this weakening, VfL created several clear opportunities.
A header from Maxence Lacroix flew just over the goal in the first minute.
Gerhardt, who is rarely considered, even had a double chance in the twelfth minute: goalkeeper Gregor Kobel fended off his first attempt.
On the second, he only hit the outside post.
But the best chance was missed by goal scorer Wout Weghorst when he came free in front of Kobel.
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Despite this increased chance, the Wolfsburg game was particularly noticeable in the absence of Arnold, Schlager and Philipp.
Because with this trio a lot of dynamism and forward drive was lost in the center.
That is exactly the strength of VfB, for which Glasner had so much respect before the game.
But the climber made too little of his tempo advantages that evening.
Only in the 24th minute was Silas Wamangituka unstoppable after a nice pass from the former Wolfsburg player Daniel Didavi.
His shot just missed the goal.
The omission of such counter-situations then took revenge shortly after the break at Brekalo's free kick.
However, the Croat was only four minutes later after a duel on the lawn and had to be replaced.
In just one weekend, the Wolfsburg drop-out list was extended from two to eight players.
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This was one of the reasons why VfL was running out of strength.
Apart from a great chance for Daniel Gincezk (74th), Stuttgart dominated the last half an hour and should have equalized: Nicolas Gonzalez was almost in front of the empty goal after a cross pass from Roberto Massimo, but didn't hit the ball properly (70th). ).
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