Record crowd: Wolfsburg's women celebrate tenth cup victory

Wolfsburg's Rebecka Blomqvist celebrates after her goal to make it 2-1. ©

In the sold-out Cologne stadium, SC Freiburg demands everything from VfL Wolfsburg. In the end, however, the favourites win the cup final.

Cologne - After some initial difficulties, the VfL Wolfsburg women's footballers won the DFB Cup final in front of a record crowd of 44,808 spectators in Cologne. The favored team of captain Alexandra Popp prevailed on Thursday after an unexpectedly tough battle with 4:1 (1:1) against SC Freiburg and crowned themselves the sole record winner with the tenth success. After the championship was practically lost, the Wolfsburg women celebrated their first title win of the season. In the final of the Champions League on June 3 in Eindhoven against FC Barcelona, they can go one better - but that will be difficult in this form.

Four days after the surprising 0-4 defeat at Eintracht Frankfurt in the Bundesliga, coach Tommy Stroot's VfL women initially left no doubt that they wanted to win the cup for the ninth time in a row. After a pass from Lynn Wilms, Lisa Karl manoeuvred the ball into her own goal to make it 0-1 (4th minute), even though Popp was initially given as the scorer. After the unfortunate start for Freiburg, young international Janina deservedly equalised in the sold-out Rhein-Energie-Stadion (42nd). Rebecka Blomqvist (57'), Popp (84') and Dominique Janssen (89') scored in the second half against Freiburg's strong goalkeeper Gabrielle Lambert.

Wolfsburg's fourth goal was preceded by the first ever VAR appearance in a women's cup final. Head referee Fabienne Michel decided on handball and penalty kick after a tip from the video assistant and looking at the video images.

The previous record attendance of 26,282 fans at the premiere in Cologne in 2010 between FCR Duisburg and USC Jena was significantly increased. Unusual for a women's game, the stadium announcer had to warn the vociferous Freiburg fans not to set off pyrotechnics before kick-off. "Fantastic! We are all happy, we all enjoy it, it's a great atmosphere. The Freiburg block in particular is really sounding the alarm," said national coach Martina Voss-Tecklenburg at half-time in an interview with Sky and praised the Freiburg women: "At the beginning they were very nervous, now they are in the game. Now it's open."

In the end, Wolfsburg trumped 1st FFC Frankfurt, who had won the cup nine times. For Popp it was already the twelfth victory in the DFB-Pokal, as she had already triumphed twice with Duisburg. The captain of the German national team missed the 2-0 after a quarter of an hour when her shot went just past the post. Otherwise, the 32-year-old had to take a lot against non-squeamish opponents.

Even without the injured DFB internationals Lena Lattwein and Marina Hegering and with striker Ewa Pajor initially only on the bench, VfL initially dominated the encounter. The SC players, who only lost 2019-0 to Wolfsburg in the 1 final, ran after a lot from the start. Coach Theresa Merk's team had to give their experienced opponents more and more chances to score, but came back shortly before the break: first national goalkeeper Merle Frohms saved from Lisa Karl, then headed in to equalize.

Freiburg went into the second half with a lot of self-confidence, but were too unsorted when they conceded the next goal against a VfL that was only convincing in places. Nevertheless, the outsiders did not give up and put Wolfsburg in trouble at one time or another. Dpa