A capacity home crowd witnessed VfB fight back with a late Sami Khedira strike to earn a 2-2 draw against Bayern München. The victory extends die Roten unbeaten streak to four matches and leaves them at tenth place with twenty-five points, one point behing Wolfsburg as the Bundesliga heads to winter break.In a match bathed with hard tackling, both sides started intensely and were committed not to give the other any space on the pitch. With Mario Gómez on the bench given his lingering injury, Ciprian Marica was handed the responsibility in the attack but after a hard challenge the former Shakhtar Donetsk man had to leave and Gómez was pressed into duty. VfB pressed but on the strength of Bavarian 'keeper Michael Rensing they were kept off the score sheet until added-time when Sami Khedira found the back of the net as he capitalized on a Jan Šimák corner that had been flicked on by Matthieu Delpierre.
The lead was short lived Tim Borowski drew the match level only three minutes into the half and he scooped in a rebound from a Bastian Schweinsteiger shot. Bayern took the lead with twenty-four minutes remaining Tim Borowski was the provider once again as fed Luca Toni for a point-blank effort. Markus Babbel called upon Turkish international Yıldıray Baştürk with fourteen minutes remaining and a further five minutes nineteen year-old Julian Schieber was called upon with for maturity beyond his years. In a critical error with five minutes left in regulation Massimo Oddo was shown a straight red for a poor challenge of Christian Träsch that will surely attract disciplinary action from the DFB. VfB was rewarded for its tenacity as the rebound off Cacau's corner was drilled to the back of the net by Sami Khedira for his second of the net and to bring the match to its final 2-2 conclusion.
Following the match Markus Babbel said:
"I am very satisfied with my team, but not quite so happy about the result. We had the opportunities to decide that game in the first half. In the end we earned the equaliser with a very determined display. I'm very proud of my team."
