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VfL Wolfsburg missed out on their first home win of the season in a turbulent encounter. Despite at one stage holding a three-goal lead, the Wolves had to settle for a 4-4 (3-1) draw against Energie Cottbus on Saturday. Team news VfL head coach Tobias Strobl made two changes from the 5-2 away win in Karlsruhe: Robert Glatzel and Maximilian Arnold came into the starting line-up in place of Kento Shiogai and Muhammed Damar, with both making their first starts since returning from injury. For Arnold, it brought a long wait to an end: the captain had last started a match on 15 February 2026 in the 2-2 draw in Leipzig. FCE coach Claus-Dieter Wollitz made three changes to his starting line-up following the 4-3 defeat against Fürth: Henry Rorig, former Wolfsburg player Tolcay Cigerci and Justin Butler replaced Christian Kinsombi, Jannis Boziaris and Moritz Hannemann, all of whom dropped to the bench. Match summary The Wolves made the better start thanks to Glatzel’s early penalty (4’), but initially struggled to build on it. Cottbus regularly attacked at pace and got close to the penalty area without seriously testing Jakub Zielinski. After around 20 minutes, VfL became considerably more dangerous: Alexander Bernhardsson hit the post following an excellent individual run (20’) before Vinicius Souza made it 2-0 from Fabian Reese’s pass (25’). Reese had the chance to add a third shortly afterwards but was denied by Marcel Lotka (27’). The third did arrive soon after, however, as Glatzel ruthlessly capitalised on a mistake from the visitors to make it 3-0 (34’). Cottbus increased the pressure shortly before half-time, with Zielinski saving from Lukas Michelbrink (44’) before Luca Erlein pulled one back in stoppage time to make it 3-1 (45’+4). Cottbus emerged from the dressing room with three changes and considerably more impetus. King Manu reduced the deficit to 3-2 early on (49’) before Tolcay Cigerci equalised from the penalty spot (67’). VfL subsequently regained their composure and pushed to retake the lead. Reese initially hit the crossbar (74’), before Mattias Svanberg, just moments after coming on, embarked on a superb solo run and made it 4-3 five minutes later (79’). However, the game took another bitter turn in the closing stages when Mathys Angely was shown a second yellow card (88’). Down to ten men, the Wolves were unable to hold on to their lead, with Dmytro Bogdanov scoring in stoppage time to make the final score 4-4 (90’+1).