“Gloria in Excelsis Deo,” sang the pious Ultras of Borussia Mönchengladbach after the 4-1 win against Holstein Kiel. Because they didn’t immediately fall into deep fear of God after a triumph in the final home game of the calendar year, they only intoned the Advent melody and replaced the lyric with a comparatively profane “Schalalala, VfL Borussia”.
Winger Robin Hack, who scored his first goal of the season in the 2-0 win, also reported from higher powers and then invoked the “great spirit” that had taken hold of this Gladbach team, which had recently seemed joyless for years, “in the last few weeks”. The Borussia team have collected 15 points from the last eight games alone and have therefore already climbed the lowest rungs of the ladder of heaven into the European Cup spheres. Hack was asked whether people weren’t starting to dream about Europe – and he answered as humbly as clubs like to hear from their players: “We’re not looking at that yet.”
History always plays a big role for a club like Borussia Mönchengladbach, which is celebrating its 125th birthday next year. When Gladbach last played against Holstein Kiel, the team on Bökelberg included strikers Jupp Heynckes and Herbert Laumen, Günter Netzer played in midfield and coach Hennes Weisweiler directed on the sidelines. On June 5, 1965, Gladbach won 1-0 against Kiel and happily collected this victory as part of a promotion round, only to be promoted to the Bundesliga for the first time three weeks later. Back then, in the summer of 1965, Gladbach won promotion group 1 and Group 2 was won by Bayern Munich. A few weeks ago, Holstein Kiel was promoted, 59 years late.
If you have to wait 59 years for another visit like the one from Kiel, then you are often in an even greater hurry. Gladbach needed 36 seconds to take a 1-0 lead on Saturday. Franck Honorat crossed to Tim Kleindienst, who scored with his head. In the end, Borussia won 4:1 (3:1), because Hack (26th) and Alassane Pléa twice (43rd, 79th) also scored when Armin Gigovic conceded 1:2. “We are now much more stable than we were a few weeks ago,” praised sports director Roland Virkus, referring to Gladbach’s current home strength with two confident 4-1 wins against Bremen and Kiel, and a 2-0 win against St. Pauli and a respectable 1-1 draw against Champions League team Borussia Dortmund.
Tim Kleindienst has almost reached his personal goal for the season
Coach Gerardo Seoane also sounds much happier at the moment than he did a few weeks ago and said: “I’m pleased with how the team brings their individual quality to the pitch.” It was precisely this profitable summation of the individual parts that was often lacking, and as a key player in this regard Center forward Kleindienst, who came from Heidenheim in the summer, was once again celebrated on Saturday. “I have rarely seen in my coaching career that a player can make such an impact on a dressing room so quickly,” Seoane reveled and said: “That’s quite impressive.”
Kleindienst played as Gladbach captain for the first time on Saturday because goalkeeper Jonas Omlin was only a substitute and Julian Weigl was missing due to a yellow card suspension. The 29-year-old called wearing the armband “an honor,” scored his ninth goal of the season to make it 1-0 after 35 seconds and was robbed of what was supposed to be his tenth shortly before the end because of a minimal offside position. Before the season, Kleindienst had set the goal of scoring in “double figures,” and now, after less than half of the season, he is already close to achieving this goal.
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