Red Star Beats Pazar With Ten Men, Needs Two Goals Tuesday

Red Star goalkeeper Savo Radanovic raced far out of his penalty area in the 72nd minute and used his hand to stop a ball running into open space behind the defense. Play went on at first, then the call came from the VAR booth. After the review, the referee showed a straight red card for denying an obvious goalscoring chance, and Dejan Stankovic sent on Mateus in his place.

Roughly twenty minutes were left at Rajko Mitic Stadium, and Novi Pazar spent them with an extra man and a clear route back into the game. Kocebu struck the crossbar in the 79th minute, Miljkovic tried a header without much power soon after, and Davidovic missed narrowly in stoppage time. Red Star’s net stayed empty.

The irony is that it was the same Radanovic who had kept the score intact earlier on. In the 12th minute he stopped Dauda after a Davidovic move, then immediately denied Kocebu from close range, at a point when the match could still have gone either way.

Katai and Enem did the job before the red card

The win was already secured before the sending off. In the second minute of first half stoppage time, Mirko Ivanic found Aleksandar Katai, and the experienced forward beat Matijasevic without hesitation. In the 58th minute Katai switched roles and set up Dzej Enem for 2:0.

It could have been more one sided. Enem hit the post with a header in the seventh minute, Katai rattled the crossbar with a long range strike in the 34th, and the visitors hit their own frame in the 79th. Three shots off the woodwork in ninety minutes show that neither side played it safe.

The win in round four of the Serbian Superliga took Star to nine points and top of the table, with a game in hand on their rivals.

Enem waited five rounds

One detail matters more this weekend than the three points: Enem had started the first five matches of the season on the bench. Stankovic did not bring him on even in Hungary, when Red Star had an extra man against Hapoel from the 60th minute, choosing Loizu and Katai after Marko Arnautovic instead. Against Novi Pazar he started and scored his first goal of the season.

That leaves the coach with three names for the striker’s role ahead of Tuesday: Enem, Arnautovic and Bruno Duarte. That is one more option than he had a week ago, and the decision on who starts will wait until the final training session.

Stankovic: Dump it all on my back

At the post match press conference, the Red and White coach did not talk about Novi Pazar but about the criticism that followed the defeat in Hungary.

Dump it all on my back, mine is a lot wider than theirs, let them keep going after me and leave the boys alone.

The line came with no lead in. He immediately shifted focus to the rematch.

Our heads are more on Tuesday than on tonight, with all due respect to Novi Pazar, who played a fair match.

He also admitted the first fifteen minutes or so were not good. “Confusion in the first 10, 15 minutes, I think it was just nerves, we’re working on keeping them calmer,” Stankovic said, explaining that the lineup had seen a lot of rotation and that players who had not started in a long time got their chance.

What does Star need on Tuesday?

At least two goals. Red and White lost the first leg of the third Champions League qualifying round 0:1 to Hapoel Beer Sheva, on neutral ground in Szombathely, Hungary, after Ahmed punished a mix up between goalkeeper Mateus and debutant Derik Lukasen in the 38th minute. To reach the playoff round, Star needs a turnaround: two goals without conceding, or three if the Israelis score at Marakana.

There is also a fact the club should keep front and center. In the first leg, Hapoel played with ten men from the 60th minute after Matan Baltaksa picked up two yellow cards in the same passage of play, and Red Star still did not equalize in that half hour. On Saturday it was the side with a man down that protected the result. A numerical advantage on its own does not decide a match, the choice of pass in the final third does, and that is exactly what was missing from Stankovic’s side in Hungary.

The rematch is on Tuesday, August 11, at Rajko Mitic Stadium.

Verdict

The win over Novi Pazar settled nothing beyond the mood heading into the European match. The rotation cost nothing, Enem made his case, and the defense passed its test with ten men. That kind of tempo will not be enough against Hapoel, because Red Star has to open the game from the first minute and accept the risk of space behind the defense.

If Stankovic starts with Arnautovic and Enem together, he has signed off on wanting a way through more than control of the match. The answer arrives Tuesday night.