At the beginning of May, the small word “Falls” is gaining in importance at football fans. The Bundesliga turns on the home straight, the table calculators are running hot and the subjunctive swings with the remaining games in every thought: If team A wins on Sunday and if team B does not go beyond a tie against team C the day before, it would look at the chances of relegation place, the Europa League, the championship, right?!
As in previous years, there are several scenarios for the sports club three game days before the end that could invite to computing games. After the away success in Wolfsburg and before the game against the Werkelf on Sunday, the team of the Freiburg coaching team greets four in the table. Due to the density of the field of participants around the international places, everything is still possible from third to ten.
Julian Schuster is probably not likely to have been thwarted the table calculator. The game days 33 and 34 are not yet relevant for the 40-year-old, the subjunctive does not help in the training ground: “If one has an arguments why I should think of the rest of the season now, then I don’t like it, so I have so far occurred: full focus on the next game.”
In this, the sports club meets the master of the pre-season, who-as of Friday-only has a minimal chance of defending the title. “You will present yourself here in such a way that you will make life very difficult for us – regardless of Bavaria’s result on Saturday,” says Schuster, who attests to the upcoming opponent under coach Xabi Alonso an “enormous further development in the past two years”.
In the first leg, the sports club presented itself well, but had to accept a high defeat-as against some top teams in the league. “We played a decent first half, but then got the 0: 1 shortly before half.
As in the past few weeks, difficult personnel decisions are scheduled for the penultimate home game of the season. “At the moment it is really very close decisions. These are nuances that depend on the approach and the opponent.” A personnel that has already been determined is the line -up between the posts. After returning to team training, Noah Atubolu will return to the squad, the goal will, at least on Sunday, but continue to be careful.
In addition to the actors on the field, Leverkusen will again depend much on the 12th man in the Europa-Park Stadium. “At the last home game, the support was incredible – we need that again on Sunday. This is brutally important,” emphasizes Schuster.
David Hildebrandt
Photo: Achim Keller
