Austria’s soccer double winner FC Salzburg would have wanted to dedicate at least one point to the late Red Bull founder Dietrich Mateschitz, who was honored with a minute of applause and a “Thank you Didi” banner. But firstly, Chelsea, Champions League winner 2020/21, is not a walk-in customer, secondly, every series has to break once. This also applies to those from Mozartstadt, who suffered their first home defeat since December 20, 2020 (2:3 against WAC) in the arena in Wals-Siezenheim, which was sold out this time with 29,520 fans.
The 1:2 (0:1) is bitter, but deserved due to a clear chance for the “Blues” before the break. It was only thanks to the outstanding goalkeeper Philipp Köhn, who particularly shone in the private duel with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, that the game was not decided after 45 minutes. Nevertheless: There is still a chance, like in the past season, to reach the round of 16 in the “premier class” with a prize money of 9.6 million euros. Because AC Milan won 4-0 at Dinamo Zagreb, Salzburg have to win at the Italian champions in Milan’s Meazza Stadium on November 2 (9 p.m., ServusTV) to still end up in the top two of the group.
However, the more likely option for spending the winter in international business is the Europa League, to which the Mozart city-dwellers could move even if they lose. That is when Chelsea (qualified for the knockout phase) score in the parallel match against Zagreb.
Anticipation of the San Siro
That’s the arithmetic known to Swiss striker Noah Okafor. “We will not give up and we will invest everything we have in this final. Nothing is lost,” said the 22-year-old. Perhaps the tense personnel situation will improve. With Solet, captain Ulmer, Capaldo and Fernando, four regular players were missing from the starting line-up against Chelsea, for whom Mateo Kovacic, who was born in Linz and was a student at Sport-MS Kleinmünchen, scored 0-1.
Köhn doesn’t let that get him down, he’s less frustrated and more aggressive: “It’s fun at this level, we want to enjoy it longer. Everyone dreams of playing at San Siro. Now we have such a cool final game there , we won’t let this defeat destroy our great starting position.”
Coach Matthias Jaissle takes a similar view, taking all the pressure off his team. From his point of view, even third place would be a huge success. The market values of the squad lists support this. Chelsea brings it to 861.5 million euros, AC Milan to 550.55 million, Salzburg to “only” 203.93 million. “Chelsea just have great individual class so you have to be prepared for defeat,” said Jaissle. “But I’m proud of my team because we were able to stand up to this world-class team.” This also applied to ÖFB striker Junior Adamu, who scored his tenth goal of the season to make it 1-1.
Source: Nachrichten
