In the end without a chance in the quarter-finals of the premier class: Arsenal’s Vivianne Miedema (left) fails Wolfsburg’s goalkeeper Almuth Schult. VfL reaches the semi-finals.
Photo: dpa/Swen gatekeeper
There isn’t a title at club level that Almuth Schult hasn’t won. The goalkeeper won the German championship five times with VfL Wolfsburg, the DFB Cup seven times in a row and the Women’s Champions League once, right in her debut season 2013/2014. It is not without a certain piquancy that an opinion maker in German women’s football can still win all three titles in her farewell season with Lower Saxony. “Three games decide the entire outcome of the season, whether we played a good season or not,” said the 31-year-old during the week.
A first big step was taken after VfL Wolfsburg reached the semi-finals of the Women’s Champions League (2-0 against Arsenal) on Thursday evening after a playful, fighting and tactical performance. A day earlier, FC Bayern had to bow out after a no less strong performance in the quarter-finals (2-2 after extra time at Paris St. Germain). The Lower Saxony wore down their opponent with a perfect attack pressing, the Bavarians, shattered by serious corona worries, offered an almost heroic fight. If proof was needed that the top German clubs with their many German national players are internationally competitive, then this proof was provided.
Now the top game is waiting in the women’s Bundesliga: leaders Wolfsburg enjoy home rights against champions Bayern, who are one point behind (Sunday 2 p.m. / NDR). It is the preliminary decision of a championship fight that – unlike the men – still deserves its name. A preliminary decision would have been made if the »wolves« won, because the rest of the program (SGS Essen, Carl-Zeiss Jena, Bayer Leverkusen) is not exactly paved with stumbling blocks afterwards.
Coach Tommy Stroot doesn’t see a disadvantage in going into the next highlight without a break. »Sleep, regenerate, work, and then the next game day comes. But that’s the coolest thing of all: these games give us great pleasure,” said the 33-year-old. The coach immediately called out to his players in a circle: “Enjoy the moment: Barcelona!”
As a reward for the brilliant performance against Arsenal in front of at least 11,293 spectators in the VW Arena – for the first time in eight years the women played there again – the duels against the defending champion FC Barcelona, who with his world record attendance – 91,553 fans at Camp Nou vs Real Madrid – is a hot topic around the world. For Schult, it’s “pure anticipation that we’ll be able to compete next at the Camp Nou.” She always had “a goal in the back of her mind” to play there one day. For teammates like Lena Oberdorf, a »childhood dream comes true«. Wolfsburg had last been in the final in 2020 and also won the female premier class in 2013 and 2014.
FC Bayern would have been only too happy to have reached at least one Champions League semi-final again after 2019 and 2021 and prevented the intra-French duel between Paris and Olympique Lyon, but the Munich team recently complained of a corona outbreak at the wrong time. After the positive tests of Linda Dallmann, Jovana Damnjanovic, Karolina Vilhjalmsdottir, Carina Wenninger, Sarah Zadrazil and Franziska Kett, Bayern lacked personal alternatives in extra time on Wednesday evening in front of 27,262 loud fans in Paris’s Prinzenpark.
Coach Jens Scheuer had to console himself with the fact that “we showed in both games that we are the better team”. His national striker Klara Bühl recommended “putting your heads up and looking ahead”. But how much strength does the decimated squad still have? After the international break, Bayern and Wolfsburg, who have shared the national title since 2015, will meet again in the semi-finals of the DFB Cup in Munich (April 17). Wolfsburg’s spokeswoman Schult sees the advantages in her team: “Hopefully you’ve seen in the last few weeks that the team has found itself more and more.”
National coach Martina Voss-Tecklenburg also believes that “what distinguishes Wolfsburg at the moment is that they have real mental players. They’ve all grown.« The internationals Lena Lattwein and Tabea Waßmuth immediately took on important roles after moving from TSG Hoffenheim and compensated for the long-term absences of top performers Alexandra Popp and Ewa Pajor, who have just returned. Wolfsburg and Bayern continue to form the benchmark for the Bundesliga, Turbine Potsdam, Eintracht Frankfurt and TSG Hoffenheim are only fighting for third place in the Champions League.
For Voss-Tecklenburg it is “impressive how far Wolfsburg and Bayern are ahead of the rest of the league. They can withstand challenges and setbacks better.« This also indicates that this dominance of the duo is being shaken so quickly.
VfL has not only signed top talent Jule Brand from Hoffenheim for the new season, but has also already clarified the goalkeeper question: Merle Frohms, the current number one of the DFB women, is leaving her contract in Frankfurt early to return to Wolfsburg. Title collector Schult will then, according to many close observers, continue her career in the US professional league.
