Two first half goals from Halil Altintop allowed Schalke to beat neighbours Borussia Monchengladbach 3-1 at the Veltins Arena on Saturday. The win ends Schalke’s two game losing streak and comes at an important time, just before their European clash against Manchester City on Thursday.
Altintop opened the scoring in the seventeenth minute, sending a right footed shot into the bottom left corner of Gladbach keeper Uwe Gospodarek. Five minutes later, Tobias Levels fouled Jefferson Farfan in the box, and the Peruvian international duly converted the resulting penalty to put the Royal Blues 2-0 ahead. Rob Friend reduced the margin for Gladbach on 30 minutes, but Altintop added one more on the stroke of half time to put Schalke into a comfortable 3-1 lead.
Gladbach had drawn with Bayern Munich last week.