Riverkings start catching up with a positive ending

Created: 01/24/2022, 14:58

By: Dietrich Limper

After a wrestling match with "Indianer", harbor judge was allowed to go into the cool box for five minutes: Ondrej Nedved (in front).

© HCL

Landsberg – 525 spectators came to the Hungerbachdome on Friday to see Sven Curmann premiere as HCL head coach.

The derby against the Indians from Memmingen ended for the Riverkings after a brilliant comeback with 5:4 (1:2;0:2;3:0;1:0) in overtime.

The game against SC Riessersee scheduled for Sunday had to be canceled - too many of the opponent's players had tested positive for COVID19.

The Riverkings remain in last place in the Oberliga Süd with 17 points.

First of all, the new coach had to count the staff with whom he could plan for the game against Memmingen: Lilik suspended, Nättinen and Neal injured, goalie Stettmer on duty for Ingolstadt.

But there was also good news: both Adriano Carciola and Mika Reuter reported that they were ready for action.

The goal was guarded by David Blaschta.

In the first two thirds, the long-suffering HCL fans experienced everything that went wrong in the Fabio Carciola era and ultimately led to his resignation.

Coach Curmann summarized after the game: "We wanted to find our salvation in counterattacks, because Memmingen was the game-determining team.

But individual mistakes and incorrect positional play have resulted in easy goals conceded.

That must not happen to us if we want to get out of there.”

Birthday boy Jonas Schwarzfischer gave the Riverkings a 1-0 lead after three minutes.

However, it only lasted two minutes, because Hafenrichter scored 1:1 after a rehearsed move.

In the 10th minute, the home side's defense was undermined by two quick passes and Petr Pohl scored to make it 2-1 for the Indians.

penalties with consequences

While the HCL cracks were still without a penalty in the first third, Carciola's suspension was promptly punished after 25 minutes: Matej Pekr shot from a distance into the corner of the Landsberg goal, which is well worth seeing, to make it 3:1 for the guests.

And when goalie Blaschta acted too indecisively after 33 minutes, Sergei Topol was able to increase to 4:1.

The game seemed over.

Until then, there had been no sign of the hoped-for positive impulse from the change of coach.

For the last third, Sven Curmann reached into his psychological box of tricks: “We decided not to look at the result anymore.

We just wanted to see what's in it for us and bang it all out again.

I demand from the team that they give their all until the last face-off.

And then we had the necessary luck.”

After excellent preliminary work by Marc Krammer, Sven Gäbelein (43rd) scored the goal to make it 2:4. Ondrej Nedved fought a wrestling match with Indianer Hafenrichter and both brawlers had to go to the penalty bench for five minutes. When the Memminger Pfalzer joined, Adriano Carciola used the space and sunk the disc into the visitors' goal with a hard long-range shot. Only 4: 3 for the ECDC. And when Nicolas Strodel equalized to make it 4:4 six minutes before the final siren, the fans were finally over the moon and sensed a minor sensation.

No more goals were scored in the final section. It went into extra time and the big performance of HCL striker Adriano Carciola followed, when he snaked through the opposing defense like an eel and netted to the much acclaimed 5:4. A goal that also put Coach Curmann in a forgiving mood: "I'm super proud of the team that they turned the game around in this situation. That was great and shows that the squad has character.”

After a performance that was not always convincing in terms of play, the Riverkings finally had the happy ending for themselves. In terms of discipline, they showed a lot of improvement: only nine penalty minutes. Curmann gave special praise to his predecessor Fabio Carciola: "I didn't have to change much in the course of the week, because what Fabio has done here makes sense. He did an excellent job right up to the last day.” Discussions with the players were more important in order to look positively ahead. The slogan for the coming weeks has not changed much: "If we keep working hard, we can still achieve something."

It is currently uncertain whether this proof of work can be provided next Friday, because the corona pandemic is causing an unstable schedule in the Oberliga Süd.

It is planned that the Höchstadter EC will present itself at 8 p.m. in the Hungerbachdome.

Two days later, at 6 p.m., the game at EV Lindau was on the program.

It is advisable to take a look at www.hc-landsberg.de in advance.