FIRST TEAM
12/01/2020

The group decider

In the Serbian league, Red Star Belgrade have dominated proceedings for several years. And they haven't been doing too badly in Europe this season either: They can secure their qualification from their UEFA Europa League group against TSG Hoffenheim on Thursday (18:55 CET, live updates on tsg-hoffenheim.de). The successful Serbs can even still top the group.

At the end of October, the Serbs went three games without a win. Coach Dejan Stankovic's team drew twice in the league and Red Star fell to a 0-2 defeat against TSG Hoffenheim in the UEFA Europa League. It was unknown territory for success-spoiled Belgrade: before that, Red Star had won all 10 games of their league games.

Yet the Red and Whites were able to recover well from the setbacks: Belgrade have won their last four games in the league and have taken four wins from four games in the Europa League since their opening day defeat. That has seen them top the table in the Serbian league with a gap of nine points to arch-rivals Partizan Belgrade and take second place in Group L of the Europa League.

Reaching the knock-out stages is now the primary objective for the Serbs. Just a point against TSG Hoffenheim on Thursday would be enough to secure their qualification. They can even still win the group. However, to do so, they will need to beat TSG, who have already qualified for the next round of the Europa League.

In the first meeting between the two sides, Red Star dropped very deep and focused on defending. The tactics were working well until Christoph Baumgartner gave TSG a 1-0 lead in the 64th minute. Coach Dejan Stankovic then got so incensed by one of the referee's decisions that he saw a yellow and then a red card and was forced to leave the Red Star bench. Munas Dabbur settled the game in injury time by scoring TSG's second to make it 2-0.

Although fans will be absent from the legendary Rajko Mitić stadium, it will still be a battle on the pitch on Thursday.

Match facts and statistics »

Download Now!
Print Page to top