A Dzenan Pejcinovic brace has helped Antonio Di Salvo’s Germany U21 squad directly qualify for the forthcoming 2027 UEFA U21 European Championship in Serbia and Albania next summer. The new Stuttgart signing scored a pair of strange goals as the DFB Juniors delivered victory to a sizable crowd at the Bielefelder Alm. The German U21s advance to next summer’s continental championship as their group winners after beating the Georgia U21s 2-0.

Di Salvo made seven changes to the XI that lined up against Malta last Wednesday. Germany began the match with an entirely new back four. Left back Tom Rothe and right back Leandro Morgalla made way for Lukas Ullrich and Elias Baum, respectively. In central defense, the injured Noahkai Banks and ill Karim Coulibaly were replaced by Joshua Quarshie and the freshly called up Nnamdi Collins. Higher up the pitch, Noah Darvich and Noël Aseko started in place of Francis Onyeka and Mert Kömür. Mio Backhaus also returned in goal to take over for Max Weiß.

Coordination problems at the back, along with some strong long throws from the Georgian guests, led to the first two chances of the match belonging to the Eastern Europeans. Inside of six minutes, the German goal was threatened twice. Di Salvo’s team nevertheless proved capable of pressing deep themselves and were able to achieve plenty of penetration on the break. Darvich’s 1-0 in the 10th minute came off a quality centralized distance effort from the Elversberg professional, admittedly helped into the back of the net via a wicked deflection off his teammate Pejcinovic.

The latter DFB actor was later credited with the goal.

Di Salvo’s charges effectively dominated the rest of the opening 45 minutes, yet weren’t able to double their advantage. New U21 call-up Paris Brunner unleashed an artistic curling effort in the 17th minute that narrowly whizzed past the post. Tresoldi received the ball in dangerous positions on a pair of occasions, but didn’t produce a genuinely dangerous chance until the 41st minute. The record-chasing German-Italian striker found himself robbed of a sure goal by an excellent point-blank-range spread save from Georgian keeper Papuna Beruashvili.

Apart from the efforts from Brunner and Tresoldi, there wasn’t much highlight-worthy.

Joshua Quarshie thought he had finally scored the 2-0 off a corner three minutes after the restart, but the goal was disallowed due to a Darvich foul in the lead up. Darvich himself froze in front of goal after another corner kick in the 55th minute, unable to properly strike a ball which fell toward him directly in front of the Georgian keeper. The guests, meanwhile, were able to threaten themselves off counters on both the left and right side during this interval. Increased German risk-taking was nearly punished on a pair of occasions.

The game opened up considerably some ten minutes after the break and an entertaining tit-for-tat ensued. The Georgians came very close to netting an equalizer in the 62nd minute when Backhaus couldn’t hold a deflected effort. The Freiburg keeper barely managed to recover in time to force Aleko Basiladze to shoot into the side netting. At the other end, shortly after being substituted on, Augsburg loanee Arijon Ibrahimovic simply couldn’t get his feet sorted out in time to capitalize on a lovely set-up from Pejcinovic directly in front of goal.