Schalke fail to beat Paderborn at home

Becker makes his first start

David Wagner made four changes to the side that defeated Hertha 3-2 in the last 16 of the DFB-Pokal on Tuesday night. Ozan Kabak, Timo Becker, Weston McKennie and Benito Raman replaced Jean-Clair Todibo, Daniel Caligiuri, Nassim Boujellab and Ahmed Kutucu in the starting eleven. It was Timo Becker’s first start for the senior side, having only previously come off the bench twice in the closing stages.

Caligiuri was ruled out due to his ligament injury sustained against Hertha, while Jonjoe Kenny, Suat Serdar (both ankle), Benjamin Stambouli (foot), Salif Sané (knee) and Markus Schubert (patellar tendon) were all unavailable.

Paderborn on the attack from the start

The visitors looked to get at Schalke from kick off, and had the first chance of the afternoon after Schalke lost possession in the own half. Streli Mamba’s shot wasn’t good enough to beat Alexander Nübel in the Schalke goal. The Royal Blues’ sprung into action after eight minutes, as Amine Harit played in Benito Raman, but the Belgian couldn’t beat Leopold Zingerle, although he was in any offside position anyway.

The Royal Blues struggled to cause the Paderborn defence any problems after the Raman chance. Christopher Antwi-Adjej had a nice run in the 22nd minute, albeit without any product as his dangerous cross evaded everyone in the box. Sebastian Vasiliadis then saw his right-footed effort just fly past the post after 32 minutes.

McKennie with the best chance for Schalke

The Royal Blues had their best chance of the first half in the 35th minute. Harit played a nice one-two with Alessandro Schöpf and then centred the ball for Raman’s shot. The Paderborn players were unable to clear the danger, and the ball landed at the feet of Schöpf, who found McKennie. The American fired at the goal from 10 yards but Zingerle was able to save the shot.

60 seconds later the Paderborn fans were celebrating but their goal was correctly ruled out for offside. Streli Mamba picked up the ball in an offside position, and beat Nübel to put the ball in the net. Shortly after, Ozan Kabak had to come off with an injury and was replaced by Jean-Clair Todibo. In the closing stages of the first half, not too much happened and the score at the break was 0-0.

Kutucu comes off the bench to score

The second half began with some confusion. Alessandro Schöpf was down in the penalty box after a tackle by Sebastian Schonlau – referee Dr. Felix Brych didn’t point to the stop. Another ball was also on the pitch at the time. Brych discussed the incident with VAR in Köln, ultimately not awarding a spotkick. Weston McKennie then fed Gregoritsch, before the Austrian missed the target from a narrow angle (48’).

Schalke were the better team after the break, although Vasiliadis’s volley almost broke the deadlock after 54 minutes. Benito Raman then hit the bar after some nice interplay between Kutucu and McKennie. S04 finally had their lead in the 63rd minute: Oczipka played it across the box to Kutucu, who turned and fired into the far corner.

Gjasula heads in the equaliser

Kutucu continued to do well in the attack, as after getting the ball back from Raman the Turkish striker unleashed a powerful shot from the the right-hand corner of the penalty area that Zingerle was equal to (71‘).On the other end of the pitch, Pröger fired a dangerous effort at goal from a short corner, but Nübel was on hand to make the save (73’).

The guests enjoyed a good 10-minute spell before their equaliser. After Nübel had turned Mamba’s long-range effort over the bar, Klaus Gjasula nodded in the following corner from close range to level the score (80’)

Schalke tried hard in the closing stages of the game to score another. Harit chipped in a free kick to the Paderborn penalty spot, where Todibo met the ball with his head. The effort was on target, but Zingerle managed to catch it (85’). Kutucu also missed a late winner with his inaccurate header from close range following Oczipka’s corner (90’). The last effort from Schöpf was blocked and the game finished as a 1-1 draw.

Mainz up next

S04’s next game is away at Mainz on Sunday, 16th February (18:00 CET). The next home match at the VELTINS-Arena is against RB Leipzig on 22nd February (18:30 CET).