Eisern NYC

BWT-Stadion am Hardtwald, Sandhausen Sunday, September 2 7:30 a.m. EDT, 13:30 CEST Referee: Timo Gerach This Match, Last Year: Sandhausen 1 - 0 Union All-Time in All Competitions: 7 Union wins, 4 Sandhausen wins, 3 draws Union's League Form: L-W-W // W-D-W Sandhausen's League Form:   L-L-W // L-L-L Grischa Prömel celebrates scoring the opener last week. The second division can get really tricky if you continually play to the level of your opponents. Of course, if it's anything like last season, then almost every fixture becomes evenly matched It can certainly be said that Union have played to the level of their opponents so far this season, but in that way, they have ground out the necessary results and sit at the top of the table. Sure, they left it late against Aue and let Jena hang in the Pokal tie a little too long. But they also snatched a difficult point from Köln in what felt like a heavyweight bout and controlled play against a St. Paul

1. FC Union Berlin: Gikiewicz; Trimmel, Hübner, Friedrich, Reichel; Schmiedebach, Prömel, Kroos (Zulj); Hedlund (Ryerson), Gogia (Redondo), Andersson FC St. Pauli: Himmelmann; Dudziak, Ziereis, Knoll, Buballa (Carstens); Flum, Buchtmann, Neudecker, Nehrig (Veerman), Moller Daehli; Diamantakos (Sahin) Goals: Union - Prömel, 44; Gogia, 45+2; Andersson, 57, 88 St. Pauli - Veerman, 71 Three happy Union Berlin goalscorers. Any win against St. Pauli -- the only 2. Bundesliga team to have branding as prevalent in certain parts of Brooklyn as Supreme, and just as overrated of branding at that -- is going to feel like a statement of intent. For that win to come against St. Pauli while they were top of the table, with two consecutive wins to start the season, takes that statement and renders it in size 42 Arial Bold font. But for that statement win to be a comfortable 4-1 victory at home that sent Union top of the league, tied with Köln on all metrics? You better get out the megaphone and

Stadion an der Alten Försterei, Berlin Sunday, August 26 7:30 a.m. EDT, 13:30 CEST Referee: Sven Jablonski This Match, Last Year: Union 1 - 0 St. Pauli All-Time in All Competitions: 10 Union wins, 7 St. Pauli wins, 6 draws Union Berlin's League Form:  D-L-W-W // W-D St. Pauli's League Form: L-W-W-L // W-W Sebastian Andersson celebrates equalizing at Köln. Source: Union Berlin . In the 2. Bundesliga, if you win all your home games and draw all your road games, you finish with 68 points and, good news, no team earning 68 points (or the equivalent in previous league/point structures) has ever failed to earn promotion. And, further good news! Two matches in, Union Berlin are on pace to do just this! Caveats of it's only August  aside, Union have done pretty much all you could ask of them so far this season: they left it late but won at home over Aue, then snatched a draw at Köln in what may theoretically be their hardest league fixture of the seaso

1. FC Köln: T. Horn; J. Horn, Sobiech, Czichos, Risse; Hauptmann (Guirassy), Clemens (Zoller), Schaub, Hector; Drexler, Cordoba (Terrode) 1. FC Union Berlin: Gikiewicz; Trimmel, Friedrich, Parensen, Reichel (Lenz); Hartel (Kroos), Prömel, Schmiedebach; Hedlund, Redondo (Gogia), Andersson Goals: Köln - Clemens, 41 Union - Anderson, 69 The Union team huddles to form a bulwark against Timo Horn's fiery ginger wrath.  If you thought Urs Fischer would try something radically different as Union Berlin prepared for quite possibly their toughest fixture of the 2. Bundesliga season, you’d be mistaken. When the starting 11 for the game against recently relegated-turned-title favorites Köln was announced, it was the same 4-3-3 that Union deployed during Matchday 1 with the exception of one change: Simon Hedlund in for Akaki Gogia on the wing. Yet what looked like a team still struggling to find its footing during last week’s narrow home win against Aue looked like a different team

RheinEnergieStadion, Cologne Monday, August 13 2:30 p.m. EDT, 20:30 CEST Referee:  Daniel Schlager This Match, Last Time:  Köln 4 - 0 Union Berlin (November 4, 2013) All-Time:  5 Köln wins, 1 Union win, 0 draws Union's League Form: W-D-L-W-W // W Köln's League Form:  L-D-L-L-L // W Köln are on pace for 102 points this season. Well, there's good news and bad news here, I guess. It's probably mostly bad news, but hey, they don't play matches on paper, they play them on dodgy Internet streams. Conventional wisdom this off-season has dictated that Köln are going to run away with the title and its automatic promotion back to the Bundesliga. They've got financial resources that most clubs at this level can barely dream of (hey, they were playing in Europe last year.) They've retained their core of players. While a 100% record would be a huge ask, it's been bandied around, albeit half-jokingly. That means, on paper, this is Union's

1. FC Union Berlin: Gikiewicz; Trimmel, Friedrich, Parensen, Reichel; Prömel, Schmiedebach (Kroos), Hartel; Gogia (Hedlund), Redondo (Mees), Andersson FC Erzgebirge Aue: Männel; Kalig, Cacutalua, Tiffert; Fandrich, Hochscheidt, Rizzuto, Herrmann; Kvesic (Rapp), Bertram (Baumgart), Nazarov (Iyoha) Goals: Union - Kroos, 87 Toni who? The 2017-2018 2. Bundesliga season for Union Berlin can best be summarized by one word: upheaval. After narrowly missing out on a promotion playoff spot during the previous season, the team seemed content to stick with what worked for 2017-2018, making few big changes to the lineup or staff. Then, things started to wrong. Coach Jens Keller was unceremoniously sacked and replaced with André Hofschneider, the coach of the club’s under-19 squad and a previous Union Berlin caretaker manager. But instead of righting the ship, the coaching change just doomed it to sink further into the abyss (or, at least, into the lower half of the table, which may