Bundesliga: Hannover 1-1 Werder Bremen

Hannover saw what would have been a crucial three points snatched from them by rivals Werder Bremen, who kept their European qualification hopes alive with a 1-1 draw.

Lars Stindl gave the Reds the lead and they looked good value for a win which would have taken them out of the bottom three until Zlatko Junuzovic equalised late on.

As a result, Hannover remain in serious relegation danger and without a win yet in 2015 while Bremen keep themselves in the race for a place in Europe next season.

Hannover spent several days of last week in a training camp to sharpen their focus for this crucial game, and it appeared to have done the trick.

It took Bremen the best part of five minutes to cross into Hannover territory as the hosts held the ball and pegged them back.

Jimmy Briand and Edgar Prib wasted chances but it was a case of third time lucky as Stindl put the hosts in front in the 21st minute, latching on to Briand's headed pass to beat Koen Casteels.

Hiroshi Kiyotake hit the post a minute later, although the offside flag was raised anyway to deny him.

Further chances came after the interval for Briand and Salif Sane with Casteels constantly the busier of the two goalkeepers.

Bremen were not posing any threat at all going forward, but a free-kick within Junuzovic's shooting range gave them a lifeline.

And they took it with Junuzovic curling his effort over the wall and past both Prib, who had tracked back to the line to try to reduce the size of the target, and Ron-Robert Zieler, who was perhaps put off by his own team-mate's presence as he failed to intervene.

It was a bitter blow to Hannover and one they failed to recover from, leaving them just two games left to try to move out of the bottom three.