If Telstar’s return to the Eredivisie remains limited to one season, they may well look at their pair of games against Excelsior and lament the leads they let slip. For the second time this season, Anthony Correia’s men surrendered a two-goal advantage against Excelsior, Irakli Yegoian and Noah Naujoks scoring late on to rescue a point for the hosts after Telstar had blunted the Rotterdam side’s attacks for the first 75 minutes. The result leaves Telstar in fifteenth, just one place and two points clear of FC Volendam in the relegation playoff spot.
Excelsior and Telstar have frequently joined battle in the second tier, but Saturday’s game was the first top-flight fixture between the two in Rotterdam since August 1975, when Telstar ran out 5-1 winners en route to a ninth-placed finish. Those heights are unreachable this season, but the sides entered the match knowing a win would move them clear of the thick of the relegation battle. For both teams, it was also a first matchup of 2026 against similar-calibre opposition, Excelsior having been no match for PSV in their first game back from the winter break while Telstar had fallen short against Ajax.
It was Excelsior who made the brighter start. A barrage of fireworks had been set off as the players entered the pitch, geeing up the sold-out stadium, and that energy seemed to spread to the home side’s players early on. Excelsior looked to attack down the wings, where Emil Hansson– signed from Birmingham City earlier this month– was making his first start for the club. Hansson was involved in an early half-chance, the Swede shooting high and wide after striker Jerolldino Bergraaf had failed to connect with a header in the box.
For all Excelsior’s possession, it was the visitors from IJmuiden who generated the better opportunities in the first half, with their six foot six striker Milan Zonneveld being denied twice from close range. The first of those denials required heroic defending from Excelsior captain Casper Widell, who came sliding in to block Zonneveld’s shot from the edge of the six-yard box. Towards the end of the opening period it was goalkeeper Stijn van Gassel’s turn to save, making himself big to turn the ball out for a corner after Patrick Brouwer had teed up Zonneveld for what looked like a tap-in. The hosts were too slow in possession to cause the stout Telstar backline serious problems, though Naujoks did put a header over the bar with half an hour gone.
Telstar continued to be the sharper team after the interval, and it was no surprise to see them take the lead six minutes after the restart. Tyrese Noslin, a Curacao international who could well feature at this summer’s World Cup, had acres of space on the right flank and skipped in a perfect cross which Jochem Ritmeester van de Kamp touched past Van Gassel and into the far corner. The 400 visiting fans, who had been in fine voice all evening, broke into even louder song now, twirling their white scarves in the air.
They soon had more reason to celebrate. Noslin was again the architect of the goal, dribbling into the area and finding Guus Offerhaus. His shot was blocked, but the rebound fell to Telstar’s ever-present midfielder Nils Rossen, who bundled home. Correia’s charges looked headed for a second away victory on the spin, having won at NAC Breda just before Christmas.
The home club had other ideas. Ruben den Uil brought on Miliano Jonathans for his Excelsior debut, the Utrecht loanee immediately forcing a first save of the game from Ronald Koeman Jr, who couldn’t hold the ball. That presented Yegoian with a shooting chance, and one he did not spurn, the Georgian hitting a piledriver to reduce the arrears. Excelsior were finally showing their teeth going forward, and minutes later they were level. Bergraaf’s initial effort was blocked, the ball sent spinning into the box, where Naujoks’ head beat Koeman Jr’s fist to the ball to score his sixth goal in the last eight matches.
Telstar came close to winning it at the death, Devon Koswal’s header hitting the post to leave them rueing what could have been and looking nervously down at the teams below them. Excelsior stay fourteenth, six points clear of the relegation playoffs.
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