Coming out to start the game (photo, 21K). The first half was actually relatively serene. Babacar N'Diaye had a good effort after around 6 minutes, but that was basically it. Both sides tried to control the midfield, neither giving an inch. The "highlights" of the 1st half were in fact the constant booing of the referee, who was total crap. Even the linemen came under fire, as one fan put it "They've obviously never heard of the offsides rule."
However, those expecting the 2nd half to be more of the same, were pleasantly surprised. Start the 2nd half (photo, 15K). The first key moment was when Kaiserslautern's starting goalie had to come out due to injury, and was replaced by veteran Gerry Ehrmann. Only seconds later, disaster for WSV: Frank Wüster, starting for suspended Sven Backhaus, headed the ball back to Jochen Gramse. He was startled by it, and the ball bounced off his chest to the feet of Junior, who tapped it in the net. 0-1.
Luckily, this served as a wakeup call for WSV. They began to charge against the Kaiserslautern goal, forcing excellent saves from Ehrmann. Brent Goulet put in a perfect cross to N'Diaye at 55 minutes, but somehow Ehrmann managed to claw the header out of the corner. Minutes later, he had back-to-back point blank saves off Glavas, who was wide open. However, even Ehrmann couldn't stop the equalizer. Panait, despite suffering from the flu, broke through and let off a pass to Goulet, who returned the cross to the Romanian playmaker, knocking it home from 8 meters. No chance for grandpa to save that one. WSV pressure on goal (photo, 15K)
WSV continued to ferociously attack Kaiserslautern's goal, and the guest defended with everything. They made it even more interesting, as Pascal Ojigwe first committed a stupid foul for a yellow card, then compounded his error by kicking the ball away - time to hit the showers. The last 10 minutes was like indians chasing around the wagon train. N'Diaye broke through alone in the 90. minute, but Ehrmann rushed out and took the ball from his feet. Finally, in injury time, Sven Steup blew the biggest chance of the game. After a nice run, he managed to miss from about 5 feet, staring at the wide open goal. It was actually more difficult to miss than score.
Somewhat unlucky for WSV, as based on their 2nd half effort, they fully deserved the 3 pts. Nevertheless, the upward trend in performance seems to be continuing.
Standings after Round 15