This Sunday finds 1. FC Union Berlin's women's team's final match of the 2022/23 Regionalliga Nordost season, as they travel to play Rostocker FC. With a win, Union will secure 2nd place in the league. Kick-off is at 14:00 at the RFC Stadium, Damerower Weg.

The opponents

After four years, Sunday's match will be Rostock's last appearance in the Regionalliga for the time being. They are bottom of the table with only four points and have been relegated for weeks. It has been a miserable year for Robert Fölsch's side (he has been head coach since 2017), as the only club to have already conceded more than 100 goals.

What makes things possibly worse is that fifty of those have come in only five games, September's 14-0 home defeat to Viktoria Berlin being particularly galling, as well as four other 9-0 losses.

Still, there have been small mercies. At least they managed a win in the second half of the season, having reached Christmas with only a single point. On matchday 21, Rostock finally beat second-bottom SV Eintracht Leipzig-Süd 1-0, with an 89th minute winner. Then, a fortnight ago, Rostock managed to defend their title in the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern state cup, with a 2-1 win over HSG Warnemünde, meaning they will at least participate in the DFB Pokal again next year.

The head to head

So far, the two teams have met four times, all of which were won by Union.

Union won 3-0 at Dörpfeldstraße earlier this season, with Hannah Kratz giving the hosts an early lead before Zita Rurack and Lisa Heiseler put the game to bed. Their joy was however overshadowed by the horrific injury to Luca Scheel, who tore her cruciate ligament.

The coach's views ahead of the match

"We are facing the last team in the table, but nevertheless Rostock showed in the last fixture that they are a strong fighting team, and accordingly we have been warned," explained Union's head coach Ailien Poese during the week.