VfB Stuttgart saw off SpVgg Greuther Fürth 5-0 in a club friendly on Wednesday evening. The match took place at the Mercedes-Benz Arena under clear skies, with the home side making their intentions clear from the opening exchanges. By then, the visitors were already on the back foot.
D. Undav opened the scoring in the fifteenth minute, a finish that caught Fürth napping. G. Promel doubled the lead two minutes later, and here's the thing — the visitors had barely recovered their shape before conceding again. Stuttgart camped in the final third, and the pressure told.
I was watching the midfield battle when the twentieth minute arrived, and what struck me was how Fürth's centre-backs were constantly called upon. They weren't able to get clear of their own penalty area, and every clearance led straight back to trouble. To be fair, they tried to hold a high line, but it wasn't working.
The second half brought no reprieve. T. van der Leij added a fourth in the seventy-seventh minute, and J. Leweling made it five with an eighth-minute strike. Stuttgart had the game won inside twenty minutes, but they didn't ease off — they kept pushing, kept searching.
The statistics tell a story of dominance without total control. Both sides shared possession evenly at 50 per cent, yet Stuttgart registered 88 attacks to Fürth's 74. Three corners for the hosts against four for the visitors says little about the flow of the game.
This result follows Stuttgart's 3-0 victory over Heidenheim last weekend, extending a run that suggests they're finding their rhythm ahead of the new season. The old head settled them down after that loss to Dortmund, and now they're playing with confidence again.
