week 5 - match preview

Royal Blues out to excite against Wolfsburg

Schalke's most recent Bundesliga home game against Werder Bremen had the fans out of their seats. And the Royal Blues are hoping to carry on where they left off when they take on VfL Wolfsburg on Saturday.

Looking ahead to the match head coach Mirko Slomka said: "In the last few days the players have been very focused and have worked very well. During training today there was again lots of talking on the pitch." The Royal Blues had a clear objective, he added: "We bloody well have to beat Wolfsburg on Saturday."

The Schalke boss knows the visitors from Lower Saxony will not make it easy for his team. When the two sides last met on 25 March Wolfsburg somewhat surprisingly grabbed a point in a 2-2 draw. "They will go into the game with that in mind and against Nancy they will have seen how they can cause us problems", said Slomka, who expects Wolfsburg to defend in depth and also warned about their aerial threat. "But during training this week we've worked on ways to counter all these things. We have to concentrate on creating chances and then take them when they come."

General manager Andreas Müller recalled another countermeasure: "The key to success will be to show the necessary aggression and win the challenges. In Berlin we did it the wrong way round, trying to play first and battle second." The 43-year-old also named a clear objective: "We want to give the fans something to cheer about. We saw how great the atmosphere was against Bremen, after all."

Apart from the suspended Mladen Krstajic Slomka will also be without Soren Larsen (knee) and Hamit Altintop (tonsillitis). But there was good news as far as Levan Kobiashvili is concerned. The Georgian came through a fitness test during training on Thursday. "His knee injury isn't fully healed yet but he's fit enough to play", explained Slomka.