U21’s misses out on late winner

The match was initially a back-and-forth affair. In the early stages, the „Lilien“ struggled to cope with Baunatal’s long balls and found it difficult to settle into the game. Consequently, the hosts managed a few attempts on goal, though none posed a serious threat. As the match progressed, the young Lilies enjoyed longer spells of possession and grew into the game; however, they were still prone to inaccuracies and turnovers that invited Baunatal to launch counter-attacks. During a subsequent strong spell, Darmstadt increasingly took control and eventually took a deserved lead in the 35th minute through Yannick Stark.

The Lilies did not get off to a good start after the break, playing too passively during the opening ten minutes. Baunatal capitalised on this, with Egli Milloshaj scoring the equaliser in the 50th minute. However, SVD subsequently found their rhythm again and increasingly shifted play into the hosts‘ half. During the final half-hour, the Darmstadt side repeatedly broke through down the flanks and delivered numerous low crosses into the box, though none found a decisive finisher. Despite their clear dominance on the pitch, the Lilies were unable to score the winning goal. Even the red card shown to Baunatal’s Elias Rohde in the 86th minute failed to change the outcome.

Head coach Patrick Kurt commented after the match: „Before the game—coming during a busy run of fixtures and facing a very physical Baunatal side on a difficult pitch—we would have gladly accepted a draw. After the match, however, given how the last half-hour played out, we felt that even more was possible. We will now take the lessons learned from this game into the training week and prepare thoroughly for our home match against FC Gießen.“

Thanks to the hard-fought draw that capped off a busy week of fixtures, the young Lilies remain unbeaten and sit in third place with eight points. On Saturday (August 22, 3pm), Patrick Kurt’s team hosts FC Gießen; despite recording three draws, the visitors currently have zero points and sit in 16th place due to a points deduction resulting from sports tribunal rulings.