Union Berlin has to fear early after the second defeat in the Europa Conference League to advance. The club from the capital lost 1: 3 (1: 2) at Feyenoord Rotterdam on Thursday and missed the possible jump to the top of Group E. With three points from three encounters, the balance of coach Urs Fischer's team fell at half time Preliminary round grow out. Alireza Jahanbakhsh (11th minute), Bryan Linssen (29th) and Luis Sinisterra (76th) scored the goals for Feyenoord. Taiwo Awoniyi (35th) was successful for the Berlin team, who lost again for the first time after four competitive games.
Unimpressed by the heated atmosphere with 45,000 spectators in the De Kuip stadium, Union's top striker Awoniyi quickly took center stage in the Netherlands. An alleged foul penalty was not given early on, while the fifth of the Eredivisie almost in return took the lead with the first good attack. The Iranian international Jahanbakhsh only had to push in after some nice preparatory work and took advantage of a lack of concentration in the defense.
The defensive player Marvin Friedrich, who was infected with the corona virus, was missing from this for a short time.
The 25-year-old had to stay in Berlin and is in quarantine at home.
Timo Baumgartl moved into the starting line-up for him.
In addition, head coach Fischer relied again on captain Christopher Trimmel, the storm duo Max Kruse and Awoniyi and regular goalkeeper Andreas Luthe.
In the 3-0 win against Maccabi Haifa, the Swiss had rotated a lot recently, but trusted his A-team against the supposedly strongest team in the group.
Arrest before the game
Nevertheless, Feyenoord took a 2-0 lead after a mistake by Robin Knoche through Linssen. Union succeeded little forward, only a corner used the Nigerian Awoniyi to connect. Many of the approximately 2,400 fans who had traveled with them had only just entered the stadium. There were extremely long waiting times at the entrance, which led to a lot of displeasure. In a tough police operation, there are said to have been injured. On the day before the encounter, there was a physical attack by Rotterdam fans on a Berlin delegation.
A group of around 25 people around Union President Dirk Zingler wanted to end the evening in a bar not far from the team hotel on Wednesday when a larger group attacked and threw tables and chairs at them.
One person was arrested, one person was hospitalized, it said.
Feyenoord apologized for the nasty attacks and promised to clarify the situation.
Union was lucky on the pitch after another mistake by Knoche at the beginning of the second half, but remained too little compelling on the offensive even after a striker change.
Rotterdam not only took the lead over time, but also increased it in the end and with seven points remains the group first.