Hannover used two quick first-half goals to jump to second place in the Bundesliga with a victory at Eintracht Frankfurt. Mohammed Abdellaoue opened the scoring after 15 minutes and Christian Schulz doubled the lead six minutes later. Didier Ya Konan then wrapped things up in the dying moments.

It was a sixth win in seven games, lifting Hannover above Bayer Leverkusen and Mainz, although they remain 12 points adrift of leaders Borussia Dortmund. Hannover coach Mirko Slomka decided before the game to drop regular goalkeeper Florian Fromlowitz in favour of Ron-Robert Zieler, a 21-year-old making his Bundesliga debut.

Eintracht had the better of the early exchanges, but Hannover grabbed the lead after quarter of an hour. Sergio Pinto stole the ball from Benjamin Kohler and his through ball found Abdellaoue, who beat Eintracht keeper Oka Nikolov to the lower left corner.

Kohler nearly made up for his mistake in the 19th minute but his blast from 20 yards went just over the crossbar. Hannover had a chance of their own a minute later but Zieler just barely pushed Emanuel Pogatetz's header over from a free kick.

The visitors doubled their lead from the resulting corner kick, which Schulz headed home from five yards. Eintracht had an opportunity to pull a goal back four minutes before the break but Kevin Kraus's header went wide right.

Hannover were close to making it 3-0 after 53 minutes but Pinto hit the right post from 19 yards and then Abdellaoue found only the side netting from the rebound.

Eintracht remained determined to get back into the game but could not beat Hannover's stingy defence - though Ioannis Amanatidis forced Zieler to make a great save on a header just seconds after being subbed into the game with 15 minutes to play.

Zieler again was superb against Caio with five minutes to play to preserve the clean sheet before Ya Konan hammered home Lars Stindl's cross in the 89th minute to make it 3-0. The defeat is Eintracht's fourth in their last six as they drop to eighth place.