Alexander Blessin: “This point is just what we need right now”

Here’s the reaction from the St. Pauli camp following last night’s 1-1 draw at home to RB Leipzig.

Martijn Kaars capitalised on a late slip from David Raum inside the penalty area, stepping up to convert a 93rd-minute penalty. His spot-kick cancelled out Yan Diomande’s second-half opener and rescued a valuable point for St. Pauli in their fight for survival.

Head coach Alexander Blessin felt his side’s persistence was ultimately rewarded:

“Nevertheless, we did a lot of things right. Then we conceded a goal we could have defended better and you think to yourself, damn, we’ve had too many games like this, but we kept believing and deservedly made it 1-1. We need to win again sometime, but this point is just what we need right now.”

Goalscorer Martijn Kaars was understandably delighted with his late contribution and praised the team’s overall display:

“It’s obviously an amazing feeling when you score late on. Every point is important for us. We played well today, created chances and deserved at least a point. I hit the penalty with power and pace and saw it was going in straightaway, though I was nervous for a moment because Gulácsi got a hand to it. It feels good, but we have to keep going like this now.”

Club captain Jackson Irvine echoed that sentiment and highlighted the response following Friday’s derby fixture:

“We could have come away with more today because we had some chances. All in all, though, our performance level was very high. We were very active from the first minute and played with lots of intensity. We deserved at least a point. After Friday’s game, we knew we had to do better. Eric Smith and James Sands won almost every second ball, which helped us a lot. Compared with our last few games, it was a big improvement in many respects.”

St. Pauli will now turn their attention to another crucial fixture on Saturday afternoon, travelling to Augsburg (15:30 CET) as they look to climb clear of the automatic relegation zone.