Wed May 7 17:02:02 2008

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Bremen clinches Champions League spot with win over Hamburg

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Hamburg, Germany (Sports Network) - Werder Bremen and Schalke will join Bayern Munich in the Champions League next season after Hugo Almeida scored in the 50th minute to give Bremen a 1-0 win over Hamburg at HSH Nordbank Arena on Wednesday.

The game was scoreless at halftime but Almeida put Bremen ahead shortly after the restart. However, the visitors were left with a nervous final 30 minutes when Frank Baumann was sent off seven minutes after the goal, and Jurica Vranjes was hit with a red card in stoppage time, leaving Bremen with nine men at the final whistle.

Hamburg needed a win to have any chance at staying close to the top three, and they came out strong in the opening 20 minutes, narrowly missing the net on two occasions before Jose Paolo Guerrero forced a diving save from goalkeeper Tim Wiese.

Almeida almost put Bremen ahead midway through the half with his team's first real chance of the game. Hamburg keeper Frank Rost was called into action when Almeida turned a header on goal from a good position, but Rost came up big and tipped the shot over the net.

The hosts were the more dangerous of the two teams, but they fell behind early in the second half when defender Bastian Reinhardt lost possession to Bremen's Markus Rosenberg, and he played a ball to Almeida inside the box for an unstoppable finish.

Hamburg tried to respond through Rafael Van der Vaart, but his effort was turned away by Wiese before Juan Pablo Sorin put a shot just wide of the post, squandering Hamburg's final chance.

Newly-crowned champions Bayern Munich continued their good form with a 2-0 win over Arminia Bielefeld. Franck Ribery and Lukas Podolski scored goals for Bayern, while the loss leaves Arminia only one point from the drop zone.

Nurnberg revived its survival hopes with a 2-0 win over fellow relegation- strugglers Duisburg. Nurnberg is just one point from safety with two matches to play, but Duisburg will have some work to do if they want to stay up because they are three points from safety.

Hertha Berlin earned a 2-1 win over Bayer Leverkusen and Wolfsburg kept its hopes alive for a spot in Europe with a 3-2 triumph against Eintracht as Edin Dzeko scored the winner with 11 minutes to play.