Union Berlin had turned the match into a fortress of bodies. Their legendary 6-4-0 formation, as the commentator joked, looked like a wall of red steel defending the one-goal lead they clung to. Every man behind the ball. Every inch contested.
Lukas drifted into the half-space, the ball glued to his left boot, but the moment he touched it, Khedira, Hollerbach, and Ljubicic — who was introduced by the Union coach as a time-wasting tactic — closed in like hunters.
"Brandt again… he's surrounded! Three men around him — nowhere to go!"
He twisted one way, then the other, shoulders rolling like liquid, just enough to slip a pass through a gap that seemed to exist only in his imagination. Götze caught it, pivoted, and squared to Ekitike inside the box.
"Ekitike—can he shoot? No space! Union's defenders have smothered him!"
