Bayern on the Couch
March 31, 2007
German champions Bayern Munich face the biggest game of their domestic season so far when they meet league leaders Schalke 04 on Saturday. But Ottmar Hitzfeld's fourth-placed team have injury and motivational problems ahead of the match which could do much to determine the destination of the title.
Bayern will be hoping Bastian Schweinsteiger's thigh injury, sustained during Germany's 2-1 victory against the Czech Republic in a Euro 2008 qualifier in Prague last Saturday, will heal in time for the influential midfielder to feature in the game.
Hitzfeld said on Munich's Web site that the midfielder "is doubtful" for the crucial league match with Schalke, which Munich need to win if they want to defend their title.
Hitzfeld prescribes extra training
Hitzfeld has planned longer pre-match training camps in a bid to make his players more dedicated in the crucial final weeks of the Bundesliga season, the Sport Bild weekly reported on Wednesday.
The coach was left fuming after the Bavarian giants' latest setback, the 1-0 defeat at lowly Eintracht Frankfurt last Saturday and wants to address what he said was "a lack of determination in front of the goal and not enough creativity in midfield."
Munich have to finish at least third in order to make qualifying for the European Champions League a possibility, and Hitzfeld is planning camps 48 hours ahead of the games and not 24 hours in a bid to push his players further.
"I am thinking about starting the training camps ahead of the matches a day earlier. Maybe the players will realize how serious the situation is if they are together over a longer period," Hitzfeld told Sport Bild.
Makaay sees title chase as mission impossible
Meanwhile, Bayern's Dutch striker Roy Makaay has said that the champions require a miracle if they are to win the Bundesliga this season.
The 32-year-old said that there was too much of a gap between them and Schalke and that they would have to look to next month's Champions League quarter-final with AC Milan to achieve anything this season.
"With nine points difference between us and Schalke 04, we need a miracle if we are to be crowned champions, especially with just eight matches remaining," Makaay told the club Web site. "We have three teams ahead of us, and aside from that we also have the Champions League quarter-final."
Makaay, who has scored 74 times including 12 this season for Bayern in the Bundesliga since he signed for 20 million euros ($26.6 million) in 2003, admitted that they needed to pull something out of what has been a generally disappointing season by their high standards.
"We have to at least finish third in the championship, and we must do something special in the Champions Leagues," admitted the Dutchman.
Bremen welcome Klasnic news
Fellow title challengers Werder Bremen, who take on Energie Cottbus this Saturday, will be buoyed by the news that their Croatian striker Ivan Klasnic underwent a successful second kidney transplant after his body rejected a kidney in January.
While Klasnic will not feature this season, news that the 27-year old will most likely recover from the kidney failure that has kept him out of soccer since December will certainly give his teammates a lift as they attempt to keep the pressure on Schalke, who are three points ahead of them.
Klasnic is out of contract at the end of the season, but Bremen have offered him a year's extension. The holder of 29 Croatian caps was due to make a decision on his playing career based on the operation's success. With the operation going well, Bremen will hope to retain his services.
"The transplantation was successful, my body has accepted my father's kidney" he told the Croatian Jutarnji List daily. "I did not want to go public with the new surgery before the doctors were sure that my body has accepted the new organ," he added.
"Thank God everything is okay now. We feel very well both my father and me. The doctors have told me that I would be able to play soccer again," he stressed.