On Wednesday afternoon, the Cannstatt Boys played out their final test friendly, before the latter half of the season gets underway this Sunday at FC St. Pauli (kick-off 13:30 CET). In a game played out behind closed doors on the VfB club grounds on Mercedesstraße, the Wasenelf took on Swiss first division side FC Luzern. At the end of the ninety minutes, the hosts ran out 3-0 (1-0) winners. Some nice play down the right set up Simon Terodde to open the scoring in the 27th minute and VfB duly took their 1-0 advantage into the break.
Once again, as has been the case in all winter friendlies thus far, coach Hannes Wolf shuffled his deck significantly for the second period (see VfB line-up). Between the posts, the coach was forced to make two changes, after Benjamin Uphoff picked up a knock. In the 51st minute, Alexandru Maxim doubled VfB’s lead with a directly converted free-kick, before Joel Sonora benefitted from some good play by Berkay Özcan to make it 3-0 (72’) – which was to prove the final score on the day. Tobias Werner (muscle bundle tear to the hip area), Anto Grgic (stomach bug) and Benjamin Pavard (precaution due to muscular problems) were all unable to participate.
On Thursday morning at 10:30 CET, VfB hold their final public training session in preparation for the away clash with FC St. Pauli.
The VfB line-up:
First-half
Mitch Langerak – Emiliano Insua, Timo Baumgartl, Jean Zimmer, Simon Terodde, Takuma Asano, Carlos Mané, Kevin Großkreutz, Christian Gentner, Matthias Zimmermann, Marcin Kaminski
Second-half
Mitch Langerak (62’ Benjamin Uphoff; 76’ Mitch Langerak) – Hajime Hosogai, Alexandru Maxim, Florian Klein, Joel Sonora ,Berkay Özcan, Daniel Ginczeck, Caniggia Elva, Julian Green, Stefan Peric, Daniele Collinge
