Top teams in check: The away lions are already ready for promotion ...

The wheat from the chaff is slowly separating in the third division: Six teams are leaving - and will probably make the promotion among themselves.

Dresden has the best squad, Ingolstadt taker qualities, but even 1860 and Türkgücü are not written off.

On the day before the 0-0 home win against Rostock, Michael Köllner had given an outlook on the rest of this intense third division season.

The 1860 coach emphasized: “It is important for us that we can say: We are still there.

We're not playing around in no man's land for the next few weeks, we're in the front third.

“The Lions are out there with five other teams who can calculate good to very good chances of being involved in the promotion battle until the end.

Our overview illuminates this six-way battle for the top three places.

It doesn't always seem confident what the top favorite does on the rise, but the bottom line is that it is enough to keep the pursuers at a distance.

The Saxons can rely on the class and depth of their cadre - and obviously on an intact morale.

Markus Kauczinski's team even finds answers to repeated blows to the neck.

A two-time deficit in Cologne turned into a 4: 2, and the two-time deficit against Lautern a 4: 3 victory.

Like all top teams in the world, Dynamo also has the dirty work victory in their repertoire.

Last shown in the late 1-0 win in the traditional duel at 1. FC Magdeburg.

Forecast:

Dresden will rise.

FC Ingolstadt (22 games, 41 points)

The initial spark was probably the last second knockout in the relegation (Nuremberg's Lucky Punch in minutes 90. + 6) - since then, the team of motivational guru Tomas Oral has not let anyone or anything throw it off track.

Standard at the FCI are tight wins, if necessary with maximum drama like the 2: 1 against Cologne with a late goal keeper (90 + 3) and a very late winner (90 + 4).

Forecast:

Anyone who has such a moral (and a top squad by the way) will stay at the front until the end.

+

Motivational speaker: Tomas Oral instilled an unshakable victory mentality into FC Ingolstadt.

© Stefan Puchner / dpa

Hansa Rostock (22 games, 39 points)

Köllner clearly illustrated what makes Rostock so special.

"You can just - like against Verl - replace four players at half-time," the 1860 coach reminded.

Result: Hansa turned the game against the strong promoted team (after 0: 2 deficit), also because the Joker Omladic and Türpitz brought fresh wind from the bench - and late turning goals.

In 2021, FC Hansa is the best team so far: four wins plus the 0-0 at the Lions.

Forecast:

Home strength, a robust defense and the 28-man squad are trumps to consolidate third place.

TSV 1860 (22 games, 38 points)

Strictly speaking, there are two "sixties" this season: the sovereign away sixties (the last of only two defeats was in Cologne at the beginning of December) - and the home lions, without an audience, only half as convincing (21 points

not

scored in 13 games

) .

Otherwise, a lot is right about 1860: team spirit, coach, tactical flexibility, the best offensive in the league and the second best defensive.

What encourages: Nine of the remaining 16 games are taking place far away from the ghostly backdrop of Giesingen.

Forecast:

park home complex, then it could be enough for relegation.

Wehen Wiesbaden (23 games, 38 points)

Perhaps the lions are not entirely uninvolved in the current high of SV Wehen (best back round team).

At 2: 2 just before Christmas, 1860 struck back thanks to luck and Joker Knöferl in the final phase (2: 2) - a virtue that the Wiesbadeners have since made their own.

Of the ten labor hits in the new year, nine fell after the break, six in the final quarter of an hour alone.

Is that also why the relegated person is in the fast lane, for seven games without a defeat - and already back in the 2nd Bundesliga this summer?

Forecast:

If six fight, the fifth (table) may be happy.

Türkgücü (24 games, 36 points)

After five games without a win and the end for Alexander Schmidt, Türkgücü has reported back.

Interim coach Andi Pummer hit the right note in the dressing room - and Lucas Röser hit the ball correctly twice.

Result: 2-1 win against Magdeburg - and another perspective in the promotion battle, in which Türkgücü starts with two handicaps: played two more games than most of the competitors - and no new coach in sight.

Forecast:

The squad should be strong enough to stay at the top - the Pummer successor has it in hand.