Christian Günter was initially happy to have gotten rid of the familiar mantra of the Freiburg sports club for the foreseeable future.
Looking at the table after his team's 4-3 win in the Baden derby at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim, the captain of the fourth-placed Bundesliga team said sentences like: "If you're there three games before the end, you don't need to say that you're fighting for the non-relegation plays.
There really is nothing more beautiful.”
Having defeated the bad relegation spirits in the recent past, with the exception of an industrial accident in the 2014/15 season, also shaped the balance of the many good deeds at SC Freiburg for years.
But now, three games before the end of the season, the club has achieved a class goal that they never dared to talk about in Breisgau.
In contrast to the 2013/14 season, when coach Christian Streich’s team last qualified for the Europa League, the Champions League is even beckoning for the first time: at first glance, an incredible rise after all the years of professed modesty that at the most tranquil location in the Bundesliga should never be confused with aimlessness.
The 29-year-old left-back Günter, captain of his team since 2020, enjoyed the moment when the highest goals were about to be realized in Sinsheim on Saturday evening.
Freiburg have already secured the DFB Cup final on May 14 in Berlin against RB Leipzig, and now, after further victories in the Bundesliga against Union Berlin and in Leverkusen, the top European division could also be added as a new platform for Freiburg’s recent continuous rise .
Captain Günter has already given the direction for the coming adventures.
“We want the greatest possible success.
That has to be the goal after a season like this.”
Günter also as a goal scorer
The one who said that was never a braggart, but always a stubborn pusher and worker on one's own form and fitness, as well as a credible leader of this team where the collective of many individuals is everything.
In this pressure-resistant ensemble, Günter, who grew up in the Black Forest holiday village of Tennenbronn, joined the Freiburg football school at the age of 14 and met his great sponsor, the then A-youth coach Streich, at a young age, something of the natural leader his team.
A player who has worked enormously on himself, his fitness and athleticism and is probably one of the reasons why he has hardly ever been injured.
To play 34 Bundesliga games in a season from the first to the last minute is for the 1,
In the final phase of this season, the defender with constant forward drive also becomes a goalscorer.
Similar to the 3-3 win against Borussia Mönchengladbach on the previous day, he also scored a goal from around twenty meters away with his left: the 2-2 (50th minute) after Hoffenheim had put Sallai (23rd) in front of Freiburg goals from Kramaric (32') and Stiller (49').
Günter then started the 3:2 for his team with a free kick with a cut to Höler, who hit the bull's eye with a header (70th).
Jeong went on to make it 4:2 (73rd).
The basis for the victory in the seventh game without a win was laid, which Rudy's goal to make it 3:4 didn't change anything (84th).
Günter, along with Vincenzo Grifo, the standard specialist of the Freiburg team, which has been strong in this discipline for years, has already prepared ten goals with his left foot this season.
Christian Günter was not surprised that the Baden goal spectacle once again ended happily for Freiburg.
"We had the hunger and the will to turn the game around," he said of his team's almost untouchable spirit at the moment.
The fact that Günter has returned to the national team this season with six appearances and has a good chance of further appearances at the World Cup in Qatar in November and December is a welcome addition for this unstoppable hard worker, who always uses his unbridled dynamism game after game enjoy fresh vigour.