Weston McKennie powers Schalke to late win against Lokomotiv Moscow in Champions League
Weston McKennie scored a late winner to give Schalke all three points in their UEFA Champions League Group D clash with Lokomotiv Moscow at the Stadion Lokomotiv.
Lokomotiv Moscow 0-1 Schalke
Goal: 0-1 McKennie (88')
McKennie registered an assist for Breel Embolo on his Champions League debut in the 1-1 draw with Porto on Matchday 1, but had only played 33 minutes of competitive football since because of a thigh injury sustained in a Bundesliga match with Bayern Munich on 22 September. The 20-year-old USA international showed no ill-effects of the problem in the Russian capital, though, putting in a typically industrious shift, from start to finish, at the heart of the Schalke midfield.
That said, Schalke needed captain Ralf Fährmann to be at his best to keep out Dmitri Barinov, while Salif Sane cleared Aleksei Miranchuk’s strike off the line. At the other end, Solomon Kverkvelia almost put through his own net late in the first half, but Guilherme recovered to spare his defender’s blushes. Schalke upped the ante as Mark Uth went within a whisker of the breakthrough, before McKennie rose above his marker to power in a Yevhen Konoplyanka corner for the win.
Match stats
- McKennie now has one goal and one assist in 33 competitive appearances for Schalke.Schalke's Hamza Mendyl and Omar Mascarell made their Champions League debuts.Schalke reached the semi-finals of this competition in 2011 but exited at the last-16 stage in their last three campaigns, the last of those coming in 2014/15.Lokomotiv's Benedikt Höwedes - a 2014 FIFA World Cup winner with Germany - made 335 appearances for Schalke, including 240 in the Bundesliga, winning the 2011 DFB Cup.The last time the hosts faced opposition from Germany was in 2002/03 when they lost 2-1 to Borussia Dortmund in the second group stage, while Schalke's last visit to Russia, to Krasnodar in the UEFA Europa League in 2016/17, ended in a 1-0 victory.Moscow's Vedran Corluka spent six months on loan at Bayer Leverkusen in 2011/12, but did not feature against Schalke.
Want more Bundesliga Action?
Line-ups
Lokomotiv: Guilherme (c) - Ignatyev, Höwedes, Kvirkvelia, Idowu - An. Miranchuk (Denisov (72'), Fernandes, Krychowkiak, Barinov, Al. Miranchuk (Zhemaletdinov 83') - Eder
Unused subs: Kochenkov, Corluka, Tarasov, Rotenberg, Lysov
Absentees: Kolomeytsev (hip), Rybus (groin), Smolov (shoulder)
Coach: Yuri Semin
Schalke: Fährmann (c) – McKennie, Sane, Naldo - Caligiuri, Rudy (Bentaleb 55'), Mascarell (Serdar 46'), Mendyl - Uth, Embolo (Burgstaller 73'), Konoplyanka
Unused subs: Nübel, Nastasic, Di Santo, Baba
Absentees: Oczipka (groin), Skrzybski (muscle), Stambouli (ankle)
Coach: Domenico Tedesco
As it happened