Sat Apr 26 13:21:21 2008

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Bremen steals late draw at Karlsruher

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Karlsruher, Germany (Sports Network) - Boubacar Sanogo scored in the 86th minute to help Werder Bremen earn a 3-3 draw at Karlsruher on Saturday.

The result keeps Bremen in second place, but they have all but handed Bayern Munich the league title with the result. A Bayern win over Stuttgart on Sunday would give the league-leaders a 12-point cushion with four games to play, leaving Bremen to battle Schalke for second place.

Sebastian Freis put Karlsruher ahead inside of 15 minutes, but Bremen responded with goals from Diego and Mesut Ozil to take a 2-1 lead at halftime. Freis leveled the match with his second goal of the game in the 59th minute and Edmond Kapllani's first goal of the season gave the hosts a 3-2 lead, however Sanogo scored with just four minutes to play to help Bremen stay in second place.

Having scored just three goals in the team's last seven games, Karlsruher got off to a good start with Tamas Hajnal playing a through ball to Freis that allowed him to get into the box and beat Bremen goalkeeper Tim Wiese.

The visitors answered just eight minutes later, however, when Tim Borowski's shot from the middle of the box was blocked by a Karlsruher defender, only for the rebound to fall to Diego at the penalty spot, and he found the bottom left corner to level the match.

Karlsruher keeper Markus Miller than made a terrible mistake in letting Ozil's shot from the top of the box to slip through his hands and find the back of the net on the half-hour mark to put Bremen in front.

Freis then tallied his second goal of the match after a fantastic 70-yard run that ended with him beating Bremen's Tim Wiese from the edge of the area.

Alexander Iashvili then crossed from the left wing to Kapllani, who took a touch to bring the ball down before poking it past the onrushing Wiese to give the hosts a 3-2 lead.

However, they could not hold that advantage as Diego lobbed a pass through the face of goal with four minutes to play and Sanogo knocked it over the goal line from a yard out.

Schalke is now level with Bremen on 54 points as Kevin Kuranyi's goal two minutes into the match stood up in a 1-0 win over Hamburg, while Hannover allowed two second-half goals to Hertha Berlin in a 2-2 draw.

The relegation battle continues to stay tight as last-place Duisburg was held to a 1-1 draw by Bochum on Stanislav Sestak's 84th-minute goal, while Nurnberg and Arminia Bielefeld finished 2-2.

Duisburg remains on the bottom, four points from safety, while both Nurnberg and Rostock sit level on 27 points, three from avoiding relegation.

Rostock missed out on a chance to leave the bottom three as they took a 1-0 lead into the final 10 minutes against Energie, only to lose 2-1. Timo Rost and Dimitar Rangelov scored goals in the final 10 minutes for Energie, which is now five points from the drop zone.