Late lead in Klassiker snatched away

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FC Red Bull Salzburg

·7 April 2024

Late lead in Klassiker snatched away

Late Konate strike cancelled out

In the 25th game week of the ADMIRAL Bundesliga, we played out a 1-1 draw against SK Rapid Vienna in the Austrian Klassiker. An intensive encounter in front of 15,000 spectators saw a dramatic end - despite the visitors' late equaliser we are now unbeaten in 16 championship group matches.

Match summary

After the draining cup battle against SK Sturm Graz in midweek, you could see our side had restored their confidence as they made a bright start under the hot spring sunshine at the Red Bull Arena. Robert Klauß's side were here to play their part too and soon appeared in the danger area. Our defensive stalwart Oumar Solet threw his frame into a stunning sliding stop to prevent Rapid striker Christoph Lang from grabbing an early lead (3').

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There was no letting up as both teams made meaty challenges and sought to probe defences. Luka Sucic (11') and fast attacker Fernando (17') both tried to net with efforts from distance - but there was no early breakthrough for our Red Bulls.

The fans were being treated to a real spectacle, with Roko Simic soon taking on the main role. The Croat pulled off a last-gasp clearance from a Rapid attack to divert the ball onto his own post (20'). Our boys responded by unleashing a number of attacks on the visiting target while getting lots of important feet in to block their build-ups.

After the two sides had exhausted their attacking efforts, a relatively quiet end to the first period ensued. A contentious collision between Simic and goalkeeper Niklas Hedl in the penalty area (43') as well as a headed chance from substitute Karim Konate did provide talking points in the interval, however, although the Ivorian sent the ball to the left of the target (45+4').

Having just returned, the chances came by the minute for Terzic (47'), Konate (48') and Simic (49'). When the visitors tried to threaten, they had a certain Strahinja Pavlovic to beat – and our Serbian centre-back had his opponents fully in check today.

Karim Konate received the ball from Amankwah Forson and hit it on target on the turn (68'). We summoned up all our strength as we launched a late push to land a killer goal.

With just minutes remaining, Petar Ratkov weaved inside from the right and found Konate in the penalty area. Konate made absolutely no mistake in front of Hedl this time, taking the ball well and converting clinically to put us 1-0 up (87').

A relieved Red Bull Arena thought that was the winner, but Rapid had other ideas - and profited from a highly unfortunate handball by Terzic in his own penalty area. Alex Schlager, who had pulled off a sensational flying save minutes earlier, had no chance of stopping Marco Grüll's spot kick (90+6').

Views

It doesn't feel great. We made things difficult for ourselves, once again, in the final third, and we didn't make the decisions we needed to get the goal. When you take the lead in the 87th minute, then you have to take it over the line - we weren't solid enough in the final few minutes. We invested a lot and expected, of course, that we'd take three points. We need to improve on that!

Gerhard Struber

It's a real shame as we know just how close it is in the league - it's annoying that we could only take a point today. We did things well for a while, but not at other times. We wanted to do more, but we didn't quite manage it. We have to keep on working on the game that we have succeeded with and find our way back to it.

Luka Sucic

Line-up

Substitutions

Konate for Fernando (25'), Koita for Gourna-Douath (62'), Ratkov for Simic (62'), Diambou for Forson (80')

Yellow card

Pavlovic (90+11' unsporting behaviour)

Injury news

Not available for the match were Nicolas Capaldo (knee), Amar Dedic (ankle), Oscar Gloukh (thigh), Timo Horn (stomach), Maurits Kjaergaard (thigh) and Leandro Morgalla (recovering).