Comeback victory for Rapid - 3:2 after 0:2 against Sturm Graz

2023-05-28 17:08:13

Hütteldorfer beat Sturm Graz 3-2 after being down 2-0 in front of 22,300 spectators at the Allianz Stadium on Sunday, celebrating their first competitive win after seven games and their first win against Sturm after ten unsuccessful attempts.

Thanks to the small revenge for the lost cup final, green and white moved up to fourth place in the master group. If this position is maintained in the final away match against Austria Klagenfurt on Saturday – a draw is enough for that – Rapid would be in the third qualifying round for the Conference League and would save themselves the European Cup play-off.

Graz, who were already runners-up, seemed to be heading for a win after goals from Manprit Sarkaria (10′) and Otar Kiteshvili (33′), but Guido Burgstaller (40′), Roman Kerschbaum (45’+4′) and Marco Grüll (66′) caused the turning point.

Before the game, Christoph Kasmüllner, Dejan Petrovic and Lion Schuster were officially dismissed – the expiring contracts of this trio were not renewed. Replacement goalie Paul Gartler received a new working paper for this until the end of 2024/25. However, Niklas Hedl was in goal again, who got fit in time after his shoulder problems.

Rapid’s goalkeeper had to reach behind him for the first time in the tenth minute. After a bad pass from Aleksa Pejic, Kiteishvili put on for Sarkaria, who made it 1-0 for the visitors via the underside of the bar. The ex-Austrian had already scored both goals for the Styrians in Sturm’s 2-0 win over Grün-Weiss in the cup final. Sturm stayed on the trigger, a long-range shot by Alexander Prass flew over the bar (26′).

Shortly thereafter, the “Blackys” increased to 2:0. Rapid’s defense lost an unfortunate figure with a throw-in, Kiteishvili fired just outside the box and the deflected shot rolled past the puzzled Hedl into the corner. In response, Block West chanted “We want to see Rapid” and the home side actually got into the game better.

Grüll brought the ball to the middle and Burgstaller scored the connection goal from the turn. The striker netted in the eighth consecutive league match, something no one in the green-and-white jersey had done before. In addition, Burgstaller, who now leads the shooting list with 21 goals, scored in the tenth mandatory home match of Hütteldorfer in a row.

That goal had a hugely positive effect on Rapid. Moritz Oswald fired over from a good position before Kerschbaum made it 2-2 just before half-time. The midfielder headed in after a Grüll corner.

At the beginning of the second half, Rapid also posed a threat from a standard situation – after a Grüll corner kick, a Burgstaller header was only centimeters short (52′). But Sturm also tried to find a way forward, and Hedl had to stretch after a header from Jan Gorenc Stankovic (58′). On the other side, Nicolas Kühn headed wide (64′).

Rapid scored the decisive goal two minutes later. Burgstaller provided a worthwhile preparatory work for Grüll, who hit the far corner flat from the penalty area line. In the end, Sturm fought doggedly to equalize, but the hosts managed to keep the lead over time.

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Zoran Barisic (Rapid-Trainer): “I’m happy, but not satisfied. We got off to a bad start, wanted to solve everything in a playful way and made mistakes in the structure of the game. We deservedly were 0-2 behind. We then made a small change in terms of the division of space and then we’re lucky went into the break 2-2. There was a lack of energy at the beginning, but then somehow – I don’t know why – it returned. In the second half we saw a better game from our team. It was a very difficult game for us, but we came back after being 2-0, so the team deserves a big compliment. We really want to finish fourth. We still have a very difficult game ahead of us. My players deserved their luck today. We were after that 2-0 on defence, pretty stable You could see when the guys got a little bit more confidence that they could kick really well so now the question is how do I instill that in them. Unfortunately I can’t go to the Billa and buy a few grams or 5 kilos of confidence.”

Christian Ilzer (Sturm-Graz-Trainer): “The defeat is very annoying, especially the how. We lost focus and excitement after the lead. The fact that Rapid came up had something to do with us. The second half was balanced, but a point would not have been deserved because “We gave up leadership like that. That must be a lesson for us. We now have to investigate the causes and take the right messages with us for the rest of the journey. We saw again today that if we’re not at 100 percent, it will be difficult. We were superior to Rapid this season only in the second half in the cup final, otherwise it was always balanced games. It was a painful defeat, but we grew into a real team. We will do everything in the last home game to win again really strong performance. It’s been an impressive season for us.”