Facts & Figures: Key Stats about the Jena Match

In the eight competitive matches played to date between SV Darmstadt 98 and FC Carl Zeiss Jena, the visiting team has never managed to come out on top. The home side won seven of these encounters, with the points shared on just one occasion. For the Lilies, this means that while all their victories over Jena so far have been celebrated at the Böllenfalltor, SV 98 is still awaiting its first competitive win in Jena. Sunday now offers the next opportunity to break this streak.

Several players have worn the jerseys of both FC Carl Zeiss Jena and the Lilien over the course of their careers. Among them is Aytac Sulu, who became a key figure at SV 98 between 2013 and 2019, captaining the team to the Bundesliga, and who also later played for FCC. Michael Stegmayer is also intimately familiar with both clubs; after making 35 competitive appearances for Jena, the left-back moved to Darmstadt in 2012 and was part of the squad that achieved back-to-back promotions from the 3. Liga to the Bundesliga. Phillip Tietz played for Jena during the 2018/19 season, scoring eleven goals in 32 third-division matches. He subsequently played for the Lilien from 2021 to 2023, playing a major role in their promotion to the Bundesliga by scoring twelve goals during the 2022/23 campaign.

In the current squad of the Regionalliga side, Manassé Eshele has a history with SV 98: the forward played for the club’s U19 team and signed a professional contract with the Lilien in the summer of 2017, though he never made a competitive appearance for the South Hessian club.

Over the past ten seasons, SVD has made it past the first round of the DFB-Pokal seven times. For the third consecutive time, Darmstadt begins the DFB-Pokal with an away match against a Regionalliga side: in 2024, they won 3–1 against Teutonia Ottensen, and in 2025, they secured a 2–1 victory at VfB Lübeck. Having successfully cleared those two hurdles, the challenge in Jena now awaits.

For years, FC Carl Zeiss Jena has been among the top teams in the Regionalliga Nordost, though they have mostly missed out on promotion. In their eleven seasons in this division to date, FCC has finished in the top five nine times—including four second-place finishes. However, they achieved promotion to the 3. Liga only once, by winning the title in the 2016/17 season. These results have enabled Jena to command a commanding lead in the all-time Regionalliga Nordost standings.

A total of 28 goals have been scored in the eight previous encounters between the Lilies and Jena, an average of 3.5 per match. Seven of the eight meetings between Darmstadt and Jena featured at least three goals; the only exception was the 0–0 draw in October 1992.

FC Carl Zeiss Jena has kept a clean sheet in three of its five league matches so far, winning each of them. A clear pattern emerges from these games: FCC defends compactly, concedes few clear-cut chances, and maintains its focus to hold onto narrow leads until the final whistle. The team often proves particularly solid defensively after the break.