AAt the end of a wonderful week for SC Freiburg, Ermedin Demirovic couldn’t be celebrated as the winning goalscorer, but the exuberance was unmistakable in the attacker’s words. Seven days earlier, Freiburg had reached the 40-point mark and thus the official goal for the season in a home game against Hertha BSC. Last Wednesday they made it into the semi-finals of the DFB Cup for the second time in their club’s history – and now they almost did too won for the first time in Leipzig.
Demirovic’s goal to make it 1-0 was the only goal of the game up until the 90th minute, before Angelino used one of the very few inattentions on the sports club’s defense to equalize. Despite this annoying ending, Demirovic felt compelled to seize the opportunity to present his deeply confident view of his club’s situation to the Bundesliga audience.
Contrary to the reluctance that has been cultivated at SC Freiburg for years in all discussions about goals for the season, one can now “think a little bigger,” said the Hamburg-born attacker, who plays for the Bosnia-Herzegovina national team. “We see ourselves as a top team,” explained Demirovic, “we can approach the matter with confidence.” What the 23-year-old professional meant was clear: Freiburg want to play in the European Cup and could even become champions for the first time if the season goes well achieve league. This actually completely utopian thought can slowly no longer be suppressed.
The Angelino from Leipzig also sees the ensemble of coach Christian Streich as equal competitors. “We’re fighting for fourth place with Freiburg,” said the Spaniard after the game. RB had hardly found any gaps in the best defense in the league and needed a lot of luck not to lose ground to the strong Freiburg on the day.
Christian Streich praised his team, and Demirovic, who was only a fifth time in the starting XI this season, played his part this homogeneous overall performance. When the Freiburg coach was asked about his striker after the game, it was less about the goal and the Bosnian’s performance and more about his behavior outside of the game.
When he asked SC to see themselves as a “top team” from now on, he immediately added that Streich could “possibly get a little angry” after such a statement, but the coach reacted calmly: “I’m rarely angry on players when they say something, especially not when they are so young.” Demirovic can “say what he wants”. Maybe he just said something anyway that Streich and others at SC have been secretly thinking for a while.
Controversial gesture of celebration
Participation in the premier class has never been more realistic for this small club, and in the DFB Cup the first major title in the club’s history is even possible. Maybe that’s why the time has now come to be a bit more research-oriented, also rhetorically. Streich will probably exchange views with Demirovic on another topic that day.
He had celebrated his hit with Lucas Höler by holding their right hands to their foreheads in a military salute. Apparently it was a ritual that had been agreed before the war in Ukraine began, but on a matchday marked by numerous messages of peace, the gesture seemed very inappropriate. “Of course, when they do something like that, they don’t think about the military,” said Streich, who had said in various interviews over the past few days how closely he was affected by the war in Europe.
“When things like this happen, of course we talk about it,” explained the coach, who repeatedly sensitizes his players to topics that are outside of football. But at the end of the week he didn’t want to be really critical of anyone, especially since Demirovic’s self-confidence could still be important. Because other offensive players like Höler or Woo-Yeong Jeong are currently not generating enough goal threat for important offensive players of an ambitious European Cup contender.
