Green Whites overcome Bochum

Mimicking their entire season, the Green Whites came back late with three unanswered goals to defeat Bochum 3-2 at Weserstadion. While Werder's Europa League hopes rest in its ongoing efforts in the UEFA Cup and the DFB Pokal, the late push has club targeting a top eight finish.

The day didn't start out well as Werder definitely didn't approach Bochum with the caution they deserved. Just down the A1, Werder's southern neighbours can pose considerable problems and have been one of the best performing sides since the start of the Rückrunde. After Markus Rosenberg came close to opening the scoring, Bochum took the lead at the sixteenth minute as Christoph Dabrowski got in-between a pass from Torsten Frings with the loose ball coming to Marc Pfertzel. Quickly sending the ball through to Stanislav Šesták on his right, the Slovakian international got behind Naldo and drove the ball through Tim Weise's legs and in. If you were to doubt the quality of Bochum or that matter Šesták, that changed a minute before the break as he scored his second of the day. Following a Werder corner that Dabrowski cleared, Šesták received the ball in his own end, navigated through stationary Green-White defenders before sending the ball in. The 39,000 in attendance let Werder know how they felt their performance ranked as they went off a the break and as the new half begin the momentum shifted quickly. Nine minutes in, Werder brought the match within one in a calm practice-grounds goal. Initiated with Diego linking up Mesut Özil who then dealt the ball to Markus Rosenberg on the far right, the striker crossed low to Hugo Almeida who redirected the ball in from a few metres. The Bochumer side were under pressure and with twenty minutes left Naldo leveled the match as he was returned the ball from Özil and after moving to his right struck the ball to the far right corner from just outside the area. Traffic was completely one way now and with nine minutes left Diego struck the winner from seven metres as he collected a high ball into the box, with virtually no challenge from Bochum and turned to volley into the net. Up 3-2 now, Werder had a chance to add to the lead but it wasn't to be and the match ended without additional scoring.