Defense bulwark with flashes of inspiration

Created: 09/30/2022, 23:50

By: Patrick Staar

Almost insurmountable: Löwen goalkeeper Enrico Salvarani made a series of grandiose saves last night.

He was supported by tirelessly fighting front men.

© Ewald Scheitterer

What a start to the season for the Tölzer Löwen: With an outstanding goalkeeper Enrico Salvarani, an almost perfect defensive performance and some flashes of inspiration, they defeated ECDC Memmingen 5:2.

Bad Tölz

– "Everyone underestimated us throughout the preparations," commented striker Ludwig Nirschl on the success.

"Now we have set an exclamation mark and shown that we can win against anyone."

“Our match plan was to play well defensively – and we stuck to that”

The guests stormed into the play-off final in the last Oberliga season, collected 99 points in the preliminary round and scored almost 200 goals.

They went into the game with confidence.

Driven by 100 non-stop singing guest fans, they established themselves in the attack third and circled the Tölzer Tor.

And the lions?

They were annoying.

And properly.

They built an impenetrable black and yellow defensive wall six or seven meters in front of their goal.

They watched the people of Memmingen intoxicate themselves with their ice skating skills and their outstanding pole technique.

And whenever danger was imminent, they energetically intervened, blocked the shots and, if necessary, dived after their opponent.

Just like Justi Späth, who saved in this way when Danyel Waizmann threatened to be overrun (8.

).

"We knew that Memmingen has enormous offensive power," commented Nirschl.

"So our match plan was to play well defensively - and we stuck to that."

Tölzer Löwen punish every Memminger position error

The best defensive work is useless if ideas are lacking in attack.

But there was no lack of that.

The lions annoyed the guests at least as much in attack as they did in defence.

Here, too, they followed every puck, discovered every positional mistake made by the sometimes careless Memmingen defensive department and punished it mercilessly.

After the third goal, Memmingen changes the goalkeeper

The first shot was in: Max Brandl fired from a tight angle, Marco Eisenhut let the puck bounce forward, and Alexander Fichtner dusted off with a precise direct shot to make it 1-0.

What happened in the 11th minute was simply mouth-watering: Ludwig Nirschl, Tyler Ward and Nick Huard shook up the Memmingen defense with three direct passes.

At the end of the lightning-fast combination, Nirschl was free in front of the goal and scored to make it 2-0 (11th).

Six minutes later, Felix Ribarik overturned the visitors' defense with a single pass.

Oliver Ott took the puck calmly, danced out Eisenhut and pushed it over the goal line like an old hand.

Eisenhut then had enough and was replaced by goalkeeper number two, Leon Meder.

The Tölzer self-confidence grows from minute to minute

The Tölzer self-confidence grew from minute to minute - also because Enrico Salvarani radiated calm in the Tölzer Tor.

There was no wobble, no rebound.

He only had to admit defeat twice: When the puck knocked on the crossbar and in the ensuing confusion Matej Pekr dusted off to make it 1:3 (36th).

And for the second time at 2:5, when a flick by Petr Pohl found its way through a crowd of people in front of the Tölzer Tor in an incomprehensible way (57th).

also read

Tölzer Löwen: Will to win intact

Tölzer Löwen: A horror film with a terrible ending

Tyler Ward crowns strong performance with two goals

You couldn't fault the guests in terms of morale: they continued to run, shoot, look for gaps in the lion's defense - and only rarely found them.

Instead, Tyler Ward rewarded himself for his strong performance with two hits, in which he repeatedly followed up so consistently until he was finally able to land a successful shot.

"Nick Huard, Tyler Ward and I had a good chemistry right away, so we could help the team," said Nirschl.

Toelzer Löwen - ECDC Memmingen 5:2

(3:0, 1:1, 1:1).

-

1: 0 (3:57) Fichtner (Brandl, Sedlmayr), 2: 0 (10:26) Nirschl (Huard, Ward), 3: 0 (16:49) Ott (Ribarik, Brandl), 3: 1 (35:28) Pekr, 4: 1 (37:36) Ward (Brandl, Eichstadt 5-4), 5: 1 (42:41) Ward (Huard, Gollenbeck), 5: 2 (56:24 ) Pohl (Kittel, Meija).

–

ECT 2, ECDC 4. –

1124.