St. Pauli travelled to the rewirpowerSTADION for the first fixture in Matchday16 in the 2. Bundesliga. In the same fixture last season, it ended in a hard fought 2-2 draw; Two John Verhoek strikes in-between goals from Heiko Butscher and Florian Jungwirth for the hosts.
After last week's disappointing 3-0 defeat way to high flying FC Ingolstadt, Bochum manager, Peter Neururer made one change to the eleven defeated in Bavaria; Marco Terrazzino replaced by Selim Gündüz. Bochum forward, Simon Terodde was looking to add to his 10 goals so far this campaign, which sees him joint top of the charts with 1860 forward, Rubin Okotie.
St. Pauli have disappointed most so far this season, as before the match they lay bottom of the table; picking up only 1 point from the last 15 possible. As a result of this poor form, manager Thomas Meggle made several changes to his side, that was defeated last week at home to Kaiserslautern. In came, Robin Himmelmann, Philipp Ziereis, Dennis Daube, Sebastian Maier and John Verhoek for Philipp Tschauner, Enis Alushi, Bentley Bahn, Michael Görlitz and Lennart Thy.
The hosts were also in poor form, with only 4 points from their last 5 games in the 2. Bundesliga, this added to the defeat to 3. Liga Dynamo Dresden in the DFB Pokal, made for bad reading for the Bochum faithful.
There was a flurry of chances early on in the game. The hosts went close after some good work by top scorer, Simon Terodde but Robin Himmelmann denied the German forward. Die Freibeuter der Liga had a chance of their own through Sebastian Schachten whose header could only be stopped by the upright. All this came within the first 10 minutes.
From this point it was a game of few chances, with the play consistently being broken up with cheap fouls and misplaced passes. However, for all the mediocre play the deadlock was to be broken in the 33rd minute. After some sloppy passing from the Bochum defence the ball landed at the feat of an on-rushing Daniel Buballa, who found Verhoek; the Dutch striker beat his man and unleashed a powerful effort straight into Andreas Luthe's net. Cue jubilant scenes from the travelling St. Pauli fans and players alike. St. Pauli's number 12 scoring his third goal in two visits to the rewirpowerSTADION.
The goal seemed to spark the game into life and Bochum would be level only three minutes later, in the cruelest of forms from a St. Pauli perspective. The ball was fizzed across the visitors area and looked to be missing everyone, except for the unaware Philipp Ziereis who sent the ball past his own 'keepr and levelled the scores.
You couldn't write what was happening and only another three minutes later, St. Pauli would once again be back infront. Both defences certainly weren't in form. Sebastian Maier found an unmarked Dennis Daube who emphatically slammed the ball past Luthe at the goalkeeper near post; in all honesty the Bochum stopper should have done much better. This time both defences would manage longer than three minutes without conceding; leaving the score at 2:1 to the visitors going into the halftime break.
The second half began in similar fashion to the last 15 minutes of the first, but instead of a flurry of goals, we saw a plethora of good saves from both keepers. You could sense that either side would sooner or later would take one of these chances and it proved to be true when Stanislav Šesták equalised for Bochum. A looping ball whipped in from the former Eintracht Frankfurt right back, Stefano Celozzi found an unmarked Šesták, who did superbly to loop his effort over Himmelmann.
However just as in the first half, we wouldn't have to wait long for another goal, this time St. Pauli taking their chance. A pretty innocuous long ball landed at the feet of substitute Lennart Thy; the St. Pauli attacker did brilliantly and squared across the box for an unmarked Sebastian Maier, who expertly beat Luthe.
It was proving to be a remarkable match, with both sides throwing the form book out of the window so to speak. For the second time in the second half the hosts would draw level, this time in the 81st minute. Again, a great delivery this time from Timo Perthel was superbly laid off first time by Terodde, which was latched onto by half time substitute Tobias Weis, who beat Himmelmann first time. Terodde whilst not scoring,was winning lots in the air giving his side a platform on which to build attack after attack.
With the way the match was going, it would have been no surprise if either side had grabbed a winner. When the ball landed at the feet of Terodde, it seemed like destiny for the striker to score the winner, however this time Himmelmann came out on top keeping the scores level.
The result see's no real movement in the table for either side; Bochum remaining in 10th whilst St. Pauli rise a place to 17th, overtaking Erzgebirge Aue. Next up for Bochum is a trip to Sandhausen, whereas St. Pauli are at home to Darmstadt.