Koch, Burkardt, Ebnoutalib: German trio fires Frankfurt past Hamburg in the cup
Three Germany internationals, three goals: Eintracht Frankfurt win 3-1 in Hamburg in the DFB Cup second round. Coach Adi Hütter hails captain Robin Koch as a leader.
Archive image · Photo: Reinhard Kraasch / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped and resized)
Eintracht Frankfurt are through to the last 16 of the DFB Cup – and all three of their goals in Tuesday night's 3-1 (0-0) win at Hamburger SV were scored by Germany internationals. In front of 57,000 fans at the Volksparkstadion, captain Robin Koch opened the scoring from close range in the 56th minute and Jonathan Burkardt made it 2-0 in the 71st. Younes Ebnoutalib, who came on for Burkardt and made his national-team debut under head coach Jürgen Klopp, all but settled the tie in the 75th minute. Terem Moffi pulled one back for Hamburg (79th).
"It's extremely important for us. We really wanted to go through and get it done," Koch said, according to Hessischer Rundfunk. Coach Adi Hütter called the recently criticised centre-back a "leader" and said: "And now he's showing it." Team-mate Mario Götze told Sky: "Robin held everything together at the back sensationally."
Hamburg were missing six regular starters, including Yussuf Poulsen and Nicolai Remberg. The last-16 draw takes place on Sunday, 1 November. Germany's final two Nations League group games follow in mid-November: in Serbia on 13 November and against the Netherlands in Berlin on 16 November.