Substitute Baumgartner turns it around as 10-man Leipzig win 2-1 at Essen
RB Leipzig reached the German Cup last 16, but only just. At third-tier Rot-Weiss Essen they fell behind after a goalkeeping error and played with ten men from the 44th minute.
Archive image · Photo: -wuppertaler / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped and resized)
RB Leipzig narrowly avoided an embarrassing exit in the second round of the German Cup on Tuesday, coming from behind to beat third-tier Rot-Weiss Essen 2-1. Substitute Christoph Baumgartner turned the match around with goals in the 78th and 82nd minutes in front of 17,467 fans at the Hafenstrasse stadium, first converting a cross from Antonio Nusa and then heading in from a David Raum delivery for coach Martin Demichelis's side.
Essen went ahead in the ninth minute when Leipzig's backup goalkeeper Orjan Nyland slipped after a short back pass from Castello Lukeba, allowing Lucas Brumme to round him and score. Shortly before halftime, Nicolas Seiwald was sent off for a second yellow card. According to the German news agency dpa, Leipzig did not manage a shot on target in the first half, while Brumme narrowly missed with a free kick that could have made it 2-0.
It was Leipzig's first away win since a 6-0 victory at Trier in the first round of the cup, ending a run of five straight away defeats. The match was overshadowed by protests against the club: overnight, unknown people had sealed the entrance to the away section with concrete and sprayed anti-RB slogans on it. Staff removed the blockade in the morning, and around 500 Leipzig fans made the trip.