Schalke in comfortable win
Gelsenkirchen - FC Schalke 04 warmed up for Tuesday’s derby against Borussia Dortmund with a 3-1 win over basement dwellers Eintracht Braunschweig at the Veltins-Arena.
Slice of luck
The hosts dominated from the outset and took a deserved lead on 17 minutes. Leon Goretzka picked up Max Meyer’s pass thirty yards out, before firing a dipping shot towards goal that whistled past Daniel Davari and into the net. The Braunschweig keeper then had to be on his toes to keep out Kaan Ayhan’s free-kick, and Meyer could have doubled the Royal Blues advantage before half-time, only for his effort from the edge of the box to fly straight at Davari.
Schalke picked up in the second half where they left off in the first and Klaas-Jan Huntelaar spurned a gilt-edged opportunity to double their lead when he failed to make proper contact with Kevin-Prince Boateng’s cut-back, allowing the visiting defence to recover and clear the ball to safety.
Huntelaar atoned for his miss 20 minutes into the second half when his long-range free-kick took a wicked deflection of Mirko Boland to wrong-foot Davari, giving the Royal Blues a 2-0 lead they richly deserved on the balance of play. Benjamin Kessel pulled a goal back for the visitors late on, but Adam Szalai sealed the points in stoppage time to clinch a third straight league win for Jens Keller’s team ahead of this week’s meeting with their local rivals.
Line-ups and statistics
