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TSG Hoffenheim landed their fifth victory in the sixth and final group game of the Europa League with a strongly rejuvenated team.
In the empty Sinsheim stadium, the Bundesliga team, who had already qualified for the knockout round, defeated Belgian runners-up KAA Gent 4-1 (2-0) on Thursday evening.
The team of coach Sebastian Hoeneß goes unbeaten in the draw on December 14th.
The 18-year-old Maximilian Beier (21st minute / 49th) with his first two professional goals and Robert Skov (26th) met.
Substitute Andrej Kramaric (64th) scored the 4-0.
Nurio Fortuna (81st) scored the consolation goal for Gent.
The Kraichgauer secured the prize of 570,000 euros in the insignificant game against the bottom of the table Gent.
For the first time in its club history, Hoffenheim is wintering in a European Cup competition.
Hoeneß changed his team almost completely.
From the 3-1 win against FC Augsburg, only defender Stefan Posch remained in the starting line-up.
The head coach gave the sovereign Philipp Pentke, who was allowed to represent regular keeper Oliver Baumann, a European Cup debut at the age of 35, as announced.
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Beier and Marco John, who was the same age, occupied the left side - and whirled mightily there.
Beier was lucky with the opening goal because his opponent Elisha Owusu headed him from a corner.
The TSG B-Team acted full of joy and was rewarded again immediately: The Dane Skov increased to 2-0 after strong preparatory work by Dennis Geiger, who was captain for the first time.
The 22-year-old was also able to thank Pentke: after just under half an hour, he ironed out Geiger's mistake with a dive after a shot from Osman Bukari.
Gent - the Belgian table-13.
Already has the fourth coach this season in Hein Vanhaezebrouck - but was unable to counter the attacking swing of the hosts.
The ex-Heidenheimers Niklas Dorsch and Tim Kleindienst did not attract much attention either.
After the break, TSG just continued like this - Beier scored with a wonderful shot to make it 3-0 against a weak opponent.
After Kramaric's 4-0 win, Munas Dabbur hit the crossbar (68th).
Across all competitions, Hoffenheim have now been unbeaten for six games, but now have three big chunks ahead of them in the league with Bayer Leverkusen, RB Leipzig and Borussia Mönchengladbach.
Leverkusen wins the group
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Group victory, a goal record and no goal for goalkeeper Niklas Lomb on his comeback after eight years: Bayer 04 Leverkusen had a perfect evening of football at the preliminary round of the Europa League.
With a 4-0 (2-0) win against the also qualified Czech champions Slavia Prague, Bayer secured first place in Group C and thus the option of a supposedly easier lot in the first knockout round in February.
In addition, Leverkusen was able to save energy for the strenuous last weeks of the year in the game that was decided early on.
Bayer has now earned EUR 4.35 million from the UEFA prize pool in the preliminary round.
In addition, the Leverkusen-based team scored more goals than any other Bundesliga club in the group stage of the competition, which was introduced in 2009.
With a total of 21 goals, the Werkself beat the previous record of Werder Bremen (2009/10) and Eintracht Frankfurt (2018/19) by three.
It was not quite enough for the international record of SSC Napoli with 22 goals from the 2015/16 season.
That was also due to the 0-1 in the first leg in Prague, Bayer's only defeat in 17 competitive games this season.
Leon Bailey (8th / 32nd), who has already scored five times in the current competition, ^ as well as Moussa Diaby (59th) and Karim Bellarabi (90th + 1) ensured a successful revenge.
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Niklas Lomb in particular was pleased that Leverkusen did not concede a goal.
The 27-year-old was allowed to guard the goal for the spared regular goalkeeper Lukas Hradecky and thus made his second appearance eight years and four days after his first competitive game for the Bayer professionals.
Like Hradecky, Bayer coach Peter Bosz also granted youngster Florian Wirtz (17) a break.
Even so, Leverkusen grabbed the game and were rewarded early on by Bailey.
After 26 minutes it should have been 2-0, but the Greek referee Tasos Sidiropoulos refused to recognize Daley Sinkgraven's goal.
The Dutchman, for whom it would have been the first goal in the 27th European Cup game, was clearly not offside, but the video evidence is not yet in use in the preliminary round of the Europa League.
Five minutes later, Bailey hit again - and this time the goal was scored. The Jamaican hit the post after a Patrik Schick header. The Czech would have loved to score against Slavia. Born in Prague, he was educated in his youth by arch-rival Sparta Prague. Since there are more important things, Bosz Schick changed as well as Bailey to spare at half time. The game was now more evenly balanced, but the Bayer win was never in danger. In the last quarter of an hour, Emrehan Gedikli (17), Samed Onur and Cem Turkmen (both 18) were three teenagers from their own offspring on the field.