Three Foals return as preparations for the Derby start

Tuesday morning saw Borussia get training underway before Saturday’s derby (15:30 CET). The 80-minute long session saw Nico Elvedi, Tony Jantschke and Christoph Kramer all return in one form or another.

This Saturday sees the Foals travel to the RheinEnergieStadion to face 1. FC Köln, for the 93rd derby between the two. Head coach Adi Hütter is looking forward to the match: “This game has a lot of significance – the excitement is there,” said the 51-year-old. “Of course, we’ll look to carry on where we left off last time, but it will be a very different game against Köln to the one against Fürth, with a very different set of emotions. They play very aggressive football, which we will need to keep a clear head for. We’ll try to work in a very focused way this week.”

The build-up to the Köln clash got underway today with a near-80-minute session at BORUSSIA-PARK. Tony Jantschke and Christoph Kramer were able to take part in the comprehensive training session. “Tony is back to doing almost everything, apart from tackles. It will still be a short while longer before he can take full part. Chris Kramer will be able to get back up to speed slowly,” said Hütter. Whilst the rest of the team – including Nico Elvedi – took part in some tactical and formation work, Jantschke and Kramer worked individually. Elvedi then sat out of the final part of the session, a match on the small pitch. “We took Nico out at the end as a precaution,” said Hütter. Furthermore, Mamadou Doucouré also trained individually today, whilst Breel Embolo and Jordan Beyer were both missing with thigh muscle problems.

The Foals will train four further times ahead of the derby: a double session on Wednesday and single session on Friday will both be held behind closed doors, and a public session on Thursday at 10:30 CET.