Bremen Move Up

In Sunday's other fixture, mid-table VfL Bochum moved out of the relegation zone with a surprise 4-1 win against fifth-placed Bayer Leverkusen.

Bremen's victory sees them move up one place to second on 54 points and, more importantly, keep pace with Schalke who on Saturday had a 2-0 home win over bottom club Borussia Mönchengladbach.

Stuttgart sit third, four points adrift of Schalke, thanks to a 4-2 victory over SV Hamburg while defending champions Bayern Munich remain fourth after coming from behind to secure a 2-1 win at Hanover 96.

However, Ottmar Hitzfeld's side are still six points behind Schalke with just six matches remaining.

"Tough game"

Bremen, who also played out a scoreless draw last weekend against Energie Cottbus and in the UEFA Cup against AZ Alkmaar on Thursday, once again struggled to find the net against Nuremberg.

In a turgid first half, the closest Thomas Schaaf's side came to a scoring opportunity occurred after 26 minutes when an off-balance Aaron Hunt found himself in space in the area but failed to hit the target.

Hugo Almeda twice went close for Bremen in the early stages of the second half before Rosenberg bundled home the winner with 15 minutes remaining having come on just five minutes earlier.

"It was a tough game just as we expected," said Werder coach Thomas Schaaf after the match.

Leverkusen's own goal

Leverkusen conceded three goals for the second game in succession as Bochum boosted their chances of avoiding the drop.

The home side, who lost 3-0 to Osasuna in a UEFA Cup quarter-final tie Thursday, went behind through a Karim Haggui own goal after eight minutes and found themselves two down after 16 minutes when a totally unmarked Anthar Yahia headed home at the far post.

Haggui's miserable day continued on 22 minutes when a woefully underhit backpass was intercepted by Theofanis Gekas, who rounded Leverkusen goalkeeper Rene Adler to make it 3-0. Not surprisingly, Haggui was hauled off shortly afterwards and replaced by Andrey Voronin.

Stefan Kiessling pulled one back for Leverkusen shortly after the hour mark to make it 3-1 but later saw red for making a comment to referee Peter Gagelmann. Gekas complete the 4-1 rout for Bochum with a breakaway effort two minutes from time.

On Saturday, Borussia Dortmund eased their relegation worries with a 4-1 victory at Alemmania Aachen while VfL Wolfsburg enjoyed a 3-2 victory over Mainz 05.

Cottbus moved toward the safety of mid-table with a 3-1 win at Eintracht Frankfurt while Hertha Berlin came from behind to secure a 1-1 draw at home to Arminia Bielefeld.