Cottbus and Rostock fail to deliver - Dresden misses out on title

Leipzig (dpa) -

Energie devastated

Timmy Thiele wept unrestrainedly for several minutes, coach Claus-Dieter Wollitz strolled through the rain in the Cottbus stadium with his head down. At least the defiance returned at some point and the team said goodbye to the season with a poster: "Always forward, Energie". Completely unnecessarily too early, as the chance to secure third place in the relegation play-offs was there for a long time before the team ran into FC Ingolstadt's counterattack and ultimately lost 4-1. Qualifying for the DFB Cup in fourth place was little consolation.

"We're a damn great team and we've achieved great things, but unfortunately not the really big ones," said Thiele on ARD. "It hurts now, it will hurt for a few more days, but then we'll get back on track," said the Lusatians' top attacker.

"We're sad that we didn't get these two games. But it's also part of sport to accept defeats and deal with them accordingly," said Wollitz. The pride of only narrowly missing out on promotion to the Bundesliga 2 is yet to come. In any case, Energie was an enrichment for the league. A team that gave the established teams a fright. But also a team that showed a lack of experience and cleverness in crucial phases, such as against Ingolstadt.

Hansa's comeback is not rewarded

In the end, the mortgage from the completely unsuccessful start to the season was too great. "The starting position was difficult, we knew that before the game. But the disappointment is huge because we didn't do our homework," said Marco Schuster, who stood in for the suspended Franz Pfanne as captain in the 2-1 defeat at Hannover 96 II. They lost a game that they could have won.

"We could have finished fourth and fourth place is important. That annoys me," said coach Daniel Brinkmann. However, the coach emphasized that with a little distance, they would also realise that they had delivered a good season's performance.

And indeed: Coming from 18th place after the tenth matchday, Hansa worked their way up bit by bit, also thanks to the refreshing impulses of new coach Brinkmann. With two games to go until the end of the season, nobody would have believed that the Rostock team would be in third place. However, it is also true that FC Hansa were unable to deliver in the two decisive games. In the new season, however, the Baltic club is already a promotion contender.

Dynamo celebrates itself

The possible third third league championship missed - no matter. "Promotion is above all else," said Thomas Stamm on "MagentaSport" and was still in a celebratory mood a week after sealing the leap into league two. As was the whole of soccer Dresden. "Looking at the season as a whole, it was a very exceptional performance from the team," praised the usually critical coach after the 3-0 final victory against relegated SpVgg Unterhaching.

It's important to enjoy the moment, to take it with you. "The emotions from last weekend haven't quite sunk in yet. It was extraordinary again, what happened before the game was unparalleled," said Stamm. Thousands of Dynamo fans had gathered on the street in front of the stadium two hours before the game, the players walked the last 500 meters through a trellis and were celebrated. "There is probably no hard disk that has enough storage space. You have to process that first. No player will ever forget that until the end of their career, maybe even until the end of their life," said captain Stefan Kutschke.

The striker was already looking ahead: "Now it's about getting rid of the curse of a team in the elevator - 2nd division, 3rd division - at some point." Christoph Daferner, whose permanent signing after his loan from Nuremberg was announced to the team shortly before the game, will help with this. "He has found his base here, his haven where he can come in and feel comfortable. We will discuss all the details of his contract extension and his debut with him. But it won't be cheap," said Kutschke.

Aue aim to save season with cup win

Even after the 1-1 draw at TSV 1860 Munich, FC Erzgebirge Aue cannot simply put this season to bed. Only 13th in the table, in danger of relegation for a long time, but also opaque decisions in terms of personnel are not what they had planned in the Lößnitz Valley. There was even talk of promotion to the 2nd Bundesliga. And things looked good for a long time. On match day 15, they were still only four points behind the league leaders.

At this point, the club had seen a "worrying development in recent months", as sporting director Matthias Heidrich put it - with the result that they parted company with coach Pavel Dotchev after match day 16. After the winter break, Jens Härtel took over a team that was only tenth in the table with much praise. But even he couldn't work miracles with a squad that Transfermarkt.de rated the fourth lowest in the league.

"If you look at the bare figures, you can't be satisfied. But we also had to cope with a few setbacks," said Härtel, alluding to the immense bad luck with injuries and illnesses that the Erzgebirge team experienced and which meant that they were practically without an attack in the decisive phase of the season. However, Härtel emphasized that the team had shown character. Looking ahead to the Saxon cup final at 1. FC Lok Leipzig on Saturday, the coach said: "We want to say goodbye with a cup win and turn a mixed season into a good one."