VfB Stuttgart drew 2:2 at Eintracht Frankfurt on the final Bundesliga matchday and sealed fourth place, sending Sebastian Hoeneß’s side into the Champions League. The point was enough to keep Stuttgart in the top four and cap a turnaround that looked far less likely when Hoeneß arrived in 2023 as a relegation candidate.
Hoeneß said he had to thank the team and the club for the season and described himself as “überglücklich” about what had been achieved. He also said Stuttgart would have liked to finish the game with a win, but stressed that the club must keep its hunger for the next challenge: the DFB-Pokal final against FC Bayern in Berlin on Pfingstsamstag.
The result left Eintracht Frankfurt in eighth place and out of European competition after the summer break. For Stuttgart, it was the second time in three years under Hoeneß that the club reached the Champions League, a feat that underlines how quickly he has changed its trajectory since taking over in 2023.
The match itself began in disorder, with a six-minute delay after silvesterraketen were fired onto the pitch and smoke pots were ignited inside the stadium. Eintracht said two people were injured. Board member Philipp Reschke called the scene “ein Wahnsinn, nicht nachzuvollziehen und vollkommen inakzeptabel,” and said one lightly injured person had already gone home while one more seriously injured person was still in hospital in the evening.
Reschke also described the incidents as a “geplante Eskalation” with a “neue Qualität,” language that reflected how sharply the club saw the gap between celebration and danger. The disruption overshadowed a match that still carried major sporting consequences for both sides, with Stuttgart moving on to Europe’s top competition and Frankfurt left to regroup without any continental football after the summer.
Attention now turns to Berlin, where Stuttgart will meet FC Bayern in the DFB-Pokal final on Pfingstsamstag. For Hoeneß, the job is no longer about survival. It is about making sure a team that was once fighting relegation keeps reaching higher ground.
