The game in Frankfurt on Friday night will have a very different feel. Florian Kohfeldt will take charge of the Green-Whites for the first time and will hope to give the side an added impetus in a tough and important away game against Eintracht. SGE are unbeaten in four games in the league whereas Werder are yet to win this season. Hopefully that run will come to an end from 20:30 CET on Friday evening.
The last meeting between the two sides: Werder have struggled against Eintracht in the recent past. Werder have only won 2 of the last 14 Bundesliga matches against Frankfurt. Last season, Werder didn’t win either of their encounters against them. At the Weserstadion, the Green-Whites lost 2-1, with Frankfurt scoring the winner in the last minute of the game. Meanwhile away from home, despite being in a rich vein of form, on a brilliant run of victories and going into the break 2-0 up, Bartels, Kruse and co. came away with just a point, drawing 2-2. It’s time for a victory on Friday!
A possible suspension: Florian Kainz could become the first Werder player of the season to receive a suspension on Matchday 11. The Austrian has been booked four times in the last six games. Careful, Kainzi!
The postponed landmark: Fin Bartels did not feature last weekend and so the 30-year-old will be hoping to make his 100th Bundesliga appearance in a Werder shirt against Eintracht. Along with the Green-White achievement, it would be the former St. Pauli and Rostock striker’s 150th Bundesliga career appearance.
The pre-match quotes: “We’re not a team bursting with confidence at the moment,” Florian Kohfeldt admitted at the press conference on Wednesday. Werder will have “to be completely focused on the game, in order to “get rid of” the uncertainty in the team’s play, according to Kohfeldt: “We don’t have the time to try out new things. Our team have lots of individual quality, so we’re just focusing on improving a few specific things in training. We need to be more comfortable in bringing the ball out from defence and to keep a cool head in specific situations.” Kohfeldt expects the opponents to be very aggressive. “They are good at pressing and have lots of players who are strong in the tackle at their disposal.”
The referee: The 28-year-old Benjamin Brand will be the man in the middle for a Werder Bundesliga game for the second time this season. On Matchday 4, the referee oversaw the narrow 2-1 defeat at home to Schalke 04. He has, despite only being 28 years of age, refereed 26 Bundesliga matches already. Robert Schröder and Frederik Assmuth will be his assistants on Friday. The fourth official will be Marco Fritz and the video assistant will be Patrick Ittrich.
