Stuttgart and Schalke belatedly discover stomach for survival fight

“O n a day like today,” exhaled Stuttgart’s coach Sebastian Hoeness, “I told the boys they should go out to eat tonight, and they can have a beer as well. It’s part of letting your emotions out.” It was that kind of weekend at the bottom of the table, both for the Swabians and for Schalke, two huge clubs who have spent most of this campaign looking over their shoulders and not seeing much behind them – but two teams who, after this weekend, are very much alive and kicking.

When the Bundesliga coins its marketing strapline “football as it’s meant to be” they envisage a greater level of technical competence than these two show on a regular basis but in terms of pure adrenaline, no argument can be broached after the respective wins of two struggling giants at the weekend. Stuttgart had surfed the wave of a breathless end to their previous home game with Borussia Dortmund, going 2-0 down, playing almost an hour with 10 men and salvaging an improbable point via Silas’ equaliser, the very last kick of the game.

Here they moved out of the bottom three entirely with a win over Borussia Mönchengladbach that was their season in microcosm. Having opened the scoring with Serhou Guirassy’s neat finish – finally given after extensive VAR examination – they lost their striker when he suffered a freak injury via an accidental blow from Lars Stindl. Julian Weigl scored a penalty equaliser before another penalty – and VAR drama – with Ko Itakura finally sent off for a deliberate last-man foul on Tiago Tómas. Tanguy Coulibaly, set to leave at the season’s end, dispatched the winning spot-kick. They “trembled across the finish line,” as Bild put it. “Today,” said sporting director, Fabian Wohlgemuth, almost through gritted teeth, “there