You literally always meet twice in life.

That usually doesn't bode well.

For Eintracht from Frankfurt and especially Martin Hinteregger it was completely different on Thursday evening.

The Bundesliga football club returned to London three years after beating Chelsea in the semifinals of this year's Europa League campaign.

This time it wasn't going to Stamford Bridge in the Fulham district, but to the east of the UK capital.

Eintracht met West Ham United, seventh in the Premier League, in the first leg.

Tobias Rabe

Responsible editor for Sport Online.

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And something else was different from May 9, 2019. At the time, Frankfurt failed dramatically on penalties at Chelsea.

Hinteregger was one of the shooters who didn't stop his attempt in the "Blues" goal because goalkeeper Kepa anticipated the shot in the middle of the goal and just closed his legs to stop the ball.

Then a picture was taken of the fans hugging and comforting the sad Austrian.

A special relationship developed with the defender, whom everyone calls "Hinti" and who even has his own song dedicated to him.

On Thursday night at the London Stadium, the 2012 Olympic Stadium where West Ham have played for six years, Hinteregger went back to the supporters in the fan block.

But now he didn't need any consolation, but was happy with the around 3000 Eintracht fans about a pretty successful evening.

Frankfurt won the first leg in the semifinals with 2:1 goals.

Ansgar Knauff after just 49 seconds and Daichi Kamada (54th minute) scored when Michail Antonio (21st) conceded a goal.

The second leg will take place next Thursday (9 p.m. in the FAZ live ticker for the Europa League and on RTL) in Frankfurt.

Coach Glasner: "I'm proud"

Then it will be decided who can play for the silver trophy in Seville on May 18th, which the winner of the Europa League gets.

It is the dream of all Frankfurters, who have already made stops in Antwerp, Piraeus, Istanbul, Seville, Barcelona and now London this season - and have never left the pitch as losers.

Unlike in the Bundesliga, where they have a poor home record this season, Eintracht have not lost in European games at home either.

This gives additional courage for the second duel with West Ham in a week in front of 48,000 spectators.

There is already great enthusiasm in Frankfurt about the dream trip through this competition, which the club has defined as its own like no other.

The protagonists therefore tried to get an objective assessment of the situation, even if it wasn't easy for everyone after the next coup.

"The performance of the team impresses me," said coach Oliver Glasner.

"We come out of the dressing room, play away in front of 60,000 (spectators/editor's note) and lead after a minute because we play forward and act courageously.

I'm proud to be able to work with players like that."