Friday took us from Romania to Germany. The only direct flight, at a convenient time, was to Dortmund. The fixture arrangements were not kind as the Friday night Bundesliga game was 250KM away in Mainz.
With a risk of not making the 4pm train on time the only other option was to hire a car. It was great fun driving down the Autobahn's to the Coface Arena on the edge of Mainz. The roads were very busy but we made it to the ground with about 30 mins to spare, allowing plenty of time to pick up our tickets and scoff a Bratwurst!
The stadium was opened in 2011 and replaced the club's old Stadion am Bruchweg. Mainz were taking on Nuremburg. I have to confess to a soft spot for Nuremburg after we were so well looked after when Everton played there in the 2007 UEFA Cup group stage.
'Die Nullfünfer' have had a decent start to the season and are well placed inside the top half of the table. After a delay to kick off, thanks to said traffic, Nicolai Muller ran through after 12 minutes to give Mainz the lead before Andreas Ivanschitz rounded Nuremberg 'keeper Patrick Rakovsky to put the home side 2-0 up.
Nuremburg got themselves back into the game just before half time when Per Nilsson (40) headed home.
Nuremburg did their best to force and equaliser in the second but they were vulnerable on the break and Mainz could have added to their tally.
The score remained the same and the win lifted Mainz up into 5th place in the Bundesliga but I thought 'Der Club' deserved a share of the spoils.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.