The hangover followed the derby party: 1. FC Köln gave up a win at Arminia Bielefeld and simply cannot win two games in a row this season. One week after the clear success against Borussia Mönchengladbach, the team of coach Steffen Baumgart on the Alm couldn’t get past a flattering 1: 1 (1: 0).
After 14 games, the gap to Arminia and relegation place 17 is still nine points. The convincing Bielefeld, meanwhile, mourned a chance of only the second win of the season, relegation rank 16 is still three points away. Salih Özcan (17th) had put Cologne in the lead in front of 8,231 spectators, while substitute Brian Lasme (59th) equalized.
Baumgart had announced full attack for this game too, in the fourth minute Anthony Modeste headed to Stefan Ortega in the Bielefelder Tor. Then, however, the Cologne experienced how defensive the Arminia is.
The hosts, for their part, attacked early, did not allow Cologne to find their way into the game in an orderly manner, came to a few closings and three corners in the opening quarter of an hour – as so often this season, however, the opponent then hit the goal.
Rafael Czichos, in the absence of the ailing Jonas Hector FC captain, got through to Özcan, who played the ball from an acute angle through Ortega’s legs and led Cologne. The guest subsequently did not have the game under control.
Although the FC seemed more orderly and played close to the goal again and again, the strong running Bielefeld were very close to equalizing in several ways: Fabian Klos failed free to Cologne goalkeeper Marvin Schwänke (25th), shortly before the half-time whistle he was already defeated: Benno Schmitz cleared a Klos header only on the line (45th + 3).
Arminia, which had only lost 1-0 to record champions Bayern Munich a week earlier, sold expensively, but initially did not bring the actions to an end. Alessandro Schöpf (53.) also missed quite clearly – a frivolous loss of the ball by Cologne then put Lasme in position, who hit from the edge of the penalty area.
At least now, Bielefeld was clearly dominant in a competitive game. A long-range shot by Patrick Wimmer (67.) defused Schwäbisch with difficulty, and the hosts repeatedly conquered the balls early on.
