In the press conference ahead of Saturday evening’s (kick-off 18:30) home game against Schalke 04, head coach Marco Rose spoke about…
… team news: Not much has changed regarding the team. The only thing is Hannes Wolf is available again and has trained with the team after missing the Shakhtar game with a light infection. Denis Zakaria played around 20 minutes and that did him good. He’s working really well and is pleased to have got some match practice again. We will help him with that as best we can.
… possible rotation: When you have so many games in just a few weeks, there is no alternative to rotating players. You have to give players a break. Who and when that is, is down to how you feel. Of course, if a player is in great form, you leave them in. We know that we have another Champions League game on Tuesday, and you also have to think of the long term – what is ahead of us in two, three, four weeks’ time. Finding the right moment to give a player a rest is one of our main focuses at the moment.
… Ramy Bensebaini and Alassane Plea: When you don’t do any sport for two weeks, that has its consequences on the body. Alassane Plea coped with the break well and found his feet against Shakhtar relatively quickly. He’d have liked to play even longer. He’s missed almost two weeks of training, but still seems fresh. Ramy Bensebaini’s quarantine should end in a few days, but I don’t want to pre-empt the health authorities. To date, we’ve been working really well with the health authorities and we rely on their instructions. When Ramy gets the green light, we will carry out the medical checks and he can return to training. The Inter Milan game on Tuesday will be too soon for him though.
… the upcoming opposition: Of course, we’re aware that there’s a few things going on at Schalke, but that’s not our main point of attention. I hope that they manage to steady the ship, because Schalke is a club that belongs in the Bundesliga. You can expect them to win one or two games at some point, but we want to avoid that happening on Saturday. Schalke are a team with quality, so we have to prepare for the game in a thoroughly professional manner.
… Schalke’s winless run: Schalke are definitely very dangerous at the moment. During the week they made some decisions with the aim of bringing the team closer together. In doing so, the club want to send a message and provoke reactions. There is no reason for us to underestimate any opponent in the Bundesliga. We’ve given away a few points in the past few weeks, so on Saturday we need to bring the same performance as we did in the Champions League. We have our style of playing and we won’t change that against Schalke. We’re working on our performance. If we can bring that on Saturday, we have a big chance of causing them a lot of problems.
… possible transfers: I’m in discussions with Max Eberl every day. However, we’re not planning any business in the upcoming transfer window. The squad is well set up, and we’re expecting them to stay together. Every club is feeling the consequences of the coronavirus crisis, so winter transfers is not a topic for us.
