SC Freiburg celebrate “penalty killer” Noah Atubolu after massive home win | OneFootball

SC Freiburg had several things to celebrate in their conclusive 5-0 Bundesliga home win over Werder Bremen on Friday night. Everything went right for Julian Schuster’s Breisgauer on what was a special night for city, club, and even country. For starters, the latest three points bagged (temporarily) pushed Freiburg into the Bundesliga’s final Champions League slot.

The end result nevertheless may ultimately end up mattering less than the sum of wonderful news relating to individual components of the team. Fullback Kiliann Sildillia spectacular comeback story continues. It was the young Frenchman who opened the scoring in spectacular fashion with an overhead kick off a corner in the in the 15th.

A little later, Freiburg’s “club man” Vincenzo Grifo doubled the advantage with some of his trademark set-piece wizardly. Grifo curled a free-kick over the wall perfectly in the 33rd minute 2-0. Grifo would go on to bag a brace.

Japanese attacker Ritsu Doan may potentially wish to re-think his rumored move to Eintracht Frankfurt after bagging his own brace in the final quarter-of-an-hour. Newly reunified SCF teammates Eren Dinkçi and Jan-Niklas Beste each registered assists on Doan’s goals.

Undeniably the most pivotal moment of the game, however, came when Freiburg keeper Noah Atubolu prevented Bremen from getting back in the game with a penalty save on highly touted new Hanseatic addition André Silva in the 39th.

Atubolu quickly garners the reputation of a penalty-saving-machine. The Germany U21 No. 1 – often criticised by his own fan base – has now saved four penalties in the last calendar year.

The 22-year-old stopped Bayer 04 Leverkusen’s Florian Wirtz on match-day 15 this year. On last season’s final match day, he stopped Union Berlin’s Kevin Volland and Josip Juranovic in the same game.

Atubolu understandably gleamed in his post-match interview with German broadcaster DAZN on Friday. It wasn’t just the penalty that kept him smiling. The latest blanking of an opponent counted as his fourth straight clean sheet.

“I was very happy to save a penalty here at home in front of the fans,” Atubolu told DAZN afterwards. “It’s got to do with the fact that I spend a lot of time practicing penalties and am prepared. I have my methods, but I’m not going to give them away.”

“Atu did very well today with the many high crosses and set-pieces,” Atubolu’s head-coach Schuster added. “He showed a lot of maturity today. He has good reflexes. He makes good saves and is also good with his feet. We’re very happy to have him.”

GGFN | Peter Weis