“We absolutely deserved the win”

Marco Richter: We’re very happy to have made such a good start to the new year with this home victory in front of our fans. From the very beginning, we showed that we wanted to win. We were aggressive and tough, and didn’t allow them many chances. It was a deserved victory. Ferro made some good saves, the back four stood strong and we ran for each other. We can only be this successful when we are together and that’s exactly what we were today. We’ve got another tough game next week and we want to pick up the next three points.

Daniel Heuer Fernandes: We saw a lot of what we’d been working on in the mid-season break tonight. A willingness, a rhythm and the joy of playing. We made it really difficult for our opponents to find space. We were compact and had good moments on the counter. We controlled the game, posed a constant threat and had our chances. We’re pleased with our performance, and now it’s a case of continuing in this fashion.

"During the training camp, we discussed the upcoming 17 games, in which we want to bring exactly the kind of performance we showed today on the pitch." Davie Selke

Davie Selke: A huge compliment to the team. You can see how focused we are in the pursuit of our goal, and we got one step closer to it today. Now there are only 16 games to play. During the training camp, we discussed the upcoming 17 games, in which we want to bring exactly the kind of performance we showed today on the pitch. We now need to keep up this form week by week and build on it. We won’t always be able to do that, but we can increase the likelihood of it. I was able to play 70 minutes today, so a big thanks must go out to the medical staff, who have looked after me brilliantly and got me back on the pitch.  

Jonas Meffert: We absolutely deserved the win. Köln has a strong defence, but we were still able to create a few chances against them. We defended very well ourselves and barely gave them a sniff. And if we did, then Ferro was there to maintain our clean sheet, which was our goal. In attack, we created some luck for ourselves by constantly keeping at it and carrying on. We’ve got a great points record from the last few weeks, and today we put in a great team performance and we want to stay at the top of the league.

"We really enjoyed the amazing atmosphere created here tonight." Merlin Polzin

Merlin Polzin: We’re pleased with the result. We kept a clean sheet, something which we’d worked on a lot during the winter. We wanted to be aggressive and cover the hard yards to make it difficult for Köln today. At the same time, we tried to play our own game in attack. We were denied by Marvin Schwäbe on several occasions, but on the whole, we deserve this hard-fought victory. The togetherness between the team and the fans at the Volksparkstadion ultimately carried us to victory. We really enjoyed the amazing atmosphere created here tonight, but from tomorrow we’ll be looking ahead.

Gerhard Struber: For large parts of the game, it was a very readable performance from us. We failed to control the game in too many phases of the match. We were able to improve in the second half, but we still weren’t in control and threw the game away when we conceded the late penalty. We saw today that there’s still a long way to go for us.