FC St. Pauli

The story of the fixture FC St. Pauli against SSV Jahn Regensburg is not long in the telling, if we're honest. In the 2012/13 season Regensburg won the first meeting between the two sides 3-0, while the return fixture at the Millerntor ended in a 3-2 victory for the Boys in Brown. And that's it. But wait. For some of you, a light may have come on at the mention of that game. For that 3-2 win was one of the most ecstatic games to take place at the Millerntor in recent years. A game in which Florian Bruns scored a stoppage winner for the Boys in Brown. Yet the story only takes on its full significance if you recount what happened in the five minutes leading up to that moment.

In the 87^th minute, with the score at 2-1, Daniel Ginczek suddenly received his marching orders, leaving the Boys in Brown with the task of seeing out the game with just ten men. But two minutes after the sending-off, Wilson Kamavuaka headed home a free-kick to make it 2-2. "That was a real setback for us," said Jan-Philipp Kalla, who remembers what happened next as if it were yesterday: "Boll to Gogia. Gogia to Bruns. Bang. 3-2. Last minute home win." For the St. Pauli evergreen, who has been with the club since 2003, it was something to savour: "There aren't many grounds where that would still have been possible. It was one of those special Millerntor moments.“

There's nothing left to add really. It remains to be seen whether Sunday's game will be just as emotional. What is certain is that it's a particularly important one. A line has been drawn under the last few matches, in which Olaf Janßen's side have failed to get the reward the performances would have merited. At the pre-match press conference the head coach put it like this: "We're hungry for points and aren't moping about the ones we've dropped in recent games." Sounds like a plan.

Yet his team still have a tough Regensburg side to get past first. A Regensburg side who travel to Hamburg on something of a roll. After home wins over Kaiserslautern (3-1) and Greuther Fürth (3-2), they now want to add to their points tally on the road after three away defeats in a row without scoring. In an interview on the club website Regensburg midfielder Marc Lais announced their intentions in no uncertain terms: "We aren't going to Hamburg simply to have a look at the city or the ground. We're determined to come away with something tangible."

In terms of motivation, Lais can be certain his side are in for a rough ride on Sunday, when the Boys in Brown will be doing their utmost to send the home fans into ecstasy. Now what was that thing about Regensburg at the Millerntor and ecstasy again?

Photo: Witters