Nico Schäfer was constantly wandering back and forth on the edge of the substitutes' bench, just as his eyes flickered back and forth between his mobile phone and the lawn of the Wiesbaden football arena. As tense as the managing director of SV Wehen Wiesbaden were many at the decisive third league venues on Saturday afternoon on the last matchday.
Nerves of steel were required and nerves were shown on the fine line between promotion dream and end-of-season frustration. In the end, Wehen Wiesbaden seemed to have the best end in the heartbeat finale. When the final whistle sounded at the 1-0 home game, the 8100 spectators in the Hessian capital went into rapture - and stormed the pitch to celebrate the players.
But Schäfer made his way through the cheering crowd into the dressing room shortly afterwards, mobile phone in hand, with a frozen face: VfL Osnabrück against Borussia Dortmund II had actually pushed past the Hessians by scoring two goals in injury time – relegation instead of direct promotion is the order of the day for SVWW.
Heart-stopping finale for promotion
The winner of the day and future second division club after a crazy season finale are the Osnabrückers. Lower Saxony won 90-4 thanks to goals from Simakala (90+6 minutes) and Wulff (2+1) – and kept the equal-point players at a distance with the goal difference that was one goal better. And sent them into the extra shift relegation against the second division third-last.
The third division had a heart-stopping final of a special kind in store on Saturday afternoon. On the last matchday, four teams competed for the promotion places for the long-awaited leap into the second division – in addition to the Elversbergers, who were confirmed as the future second division club (SC Freiburg II is not eligible for promotion): Osnbarück, Wehen Wiesbaden, 1. FC Saarbrücken and Dynamo Dresden.
This is a milestone for any club, considering that TV revenues have increased almost tenfold. A direct promotion place as a jackpot, the relegation place as a consolation prize and two rivets were at stake for the quartet, which had delivered many weeks of exchange of blows for the coveted ranks. Two out of four – sounds simple, but it wasn't until deep into injury time.
All four opponents played at home, all four against teams for whom nothing was at stake, all four were able to master their daily task. For a long time, the Osnabrück team was 0-1 down at the sold-out Bremer Brücke – which prompted Wiesbaden to storm the pitch and Saarbrücken thought they were in the relegation zone. But the late luck of Osnabrück changed everything again: Saarbrücken and Dresden, who were tied on points before the last matchday, went away empty-handed. The work and sweat of 38 matchdays had not paid off by a very narrow margin.
The Dresdeners had exchanged the possible best cards in the promotion race on the penultimate matchday for the worst. Coach Markus Start's team went down 1-4 at relegated SV Meppen – a result that ultimately had a destructive effect on their chances on the last matchday. And so there was a mood of mourning in the Dresden Arena on Saturday. The 2-1 win over VfL Oldenburg did not change that.
"I believe in promotion until the last minute," said Saarbrücken striker Kasim Rabihic, who actively helped with a goal against Viktoria Köln. Ultimately, in vain. The traditional Saarland club also came away empty-handed and has to wait for the return to the second division after relegation in 2006. FCS was able to put pressure on the competition early on – Gaus scored in the first minute to take the lead. But the 2-1 victory was ultimately worthless, because the Osnabrück defended their pole position in the promotion race in the narrowest possible way and started an emotionally high-speed party weekend.