AB Gladsaxe played earlier today at Gladsaxe Stadium, and 491 spectators had turned up for the 1st match in the promotion play-off against Esbjerg fB, who are the 2nd division leaders. The game ends 2-1 and thus the first victory of the spring has been secured.
Compared to the match against Middelfart, there were several changes in the starting line-up. Mikkel Brund replaced Daniel A. Pedersen, who was out with an injury. Christian Wagner replaced O’Vonte Mullings. Hørdur Askham was out with an injury and Tim Freriks sat out with quarantine.
The following players were selected for the starting lineup:
16 Albert Gaub-Jacobsen (goalkeeper)
3 Erik Lindell
4 Adrien Koudelka
5 Rasmus Brodersen
8 Darren Sidoel
11 Flamur Dzelili
15 Søren Ilsøe
17 Yushi Yamaya
19 Christian Wagner
22 Ágúst Hlynsson
34 Mikkel Brund
It was the 2nd division’s absolute top team that came to Gladsaxe today. AB had changed the game system for the match and played with 2 men at the top. Already after 3 minutes, Esbjerg has a good shot on goal, but luckily it was over. Good passes between Flamur Dzelili and Ágúst Hlynsson gave a finish, but Esbjerg’s goalkeeper saved for a corner. The subsequent corner kick did not make any change despite two finishes. Esbjerg was quickly on the track, helped by the strong tailwind along the track.
After 13 minutes, an Esbjerg player is completely free, but does not hit the ball. Less than 10 minutes later, Darren Sidoel is the savior, when he parries a cross that would otherwise have ended up with Emil Holten, who was completely free and with a great chance of a good finish. AB’s back line stood really well today, and repeatedly averted situations that could have ended in goals. Esbjerg gets a few more chances, but either a header is over the goal or Albert Gaub-Jakobsen saves. AB gets a counter and Christian Wagner dribbles forward on the field, passes towards the middle to Yushi Yamaya, who passes the opposite to Rasmus Brodersen, but his finish ends up over the goal. Esbjerg gets a free kick, after which Flamur Dzelili kicks the ball. Of course, this triggers a stupid warning. Shortly before the break, Ágúst Hlynsson makes a move into the field, but is fouled. Darren Sidoel takes the free kick and shoots a really good shot close to goal, but the shot is deflected.
At half-time, the score was 0-0. After 5 minutes, Christian Wagner runs from the middle on a good pass from Søren Ilsøe directly towards goal. When his defender was very close to him, he played the ball on to O’Vonte Mullings in the middle, and his finish ended up in the goal for a 1-0 lead. Only a few minutes later, Esbjerg has a conversion and gets the chance to finish. Nicklas Strunck Jakobsen does that safely and equalizes to 1-1.
AB stands low on the pitch, and Esbjerg presses on and has several finishes, which end up over the goal or next to the goal. The chances come as AB combines quickly on the field, but the finishing is not good enough. After 73 min. Darren Sidoel takes a free kick and shoots at goal, so the goalkeeper has to make a huge save. Esbjerg is several times close with finishes, which were again saved by a vigilant Albert Gaub-Jakobsen.
After 75 minutes, O’Vonte Mullings gets hold of the ball in the box, dribbles through a couple of Esbjerg players and shoots a really good shot, which the goalkeeper parries. Darren Sideol follows up on the riposte and scores safely to lead 2-1.
That was also the result of the match! Head coach David Roufpanah said after the game: “It was really nice to get a win today. We are very happy. Both the players and our fans deserved a win. We have worked so hard for it. We’ve had really good performances, but it’s just so important in football to win games. We changed a little in our structure today and then win against the 2nd division’s best team. It was important for us to play with a slightly different structure. We know that Esbjerg are good at playing behind the back line. They are good at composing in the passing game. We knew it was too risky to stand too low on the pitch. We have had some replacements in the team since the start of the season also after the New Year. So a large part of our starting line-up is new players, so of course it takes some time to get consistency in the game. We don’t just work our football game, but also on the unity of the squad off the pitch. That we get this feeling of being like a family, that’s very important to me.”
Captain Darren Sidoel said: “It was really nice that we got a win today. It’s been a few months since we won a match. So it feels really good to get the 3 points. I think it’s very positive for the team, and we can build on that from here. I really think we worked together as a team today. Every single meter on the pitch we worked for each other and we helped each other. We had changed some things in our strategy, and for us it worked really well today.”
During the match, Flamur Dzelili was replaced by O’Vonte Mullings, Mark Garly Pedersen replaced Yushi Yamaya, Julius Lind replaced Ágúst Hlynsson and Ahmed Hassan replaced Christian Wagner.
AB played one of the best games of the season and it guarantees more points if the intensity and cohesion are maintained.
The next match will be played on Friday 19 April at 19:00 in Roskilde Sports Park.
