Press conference

“We’ll follow our plan, but also adapt to what the opponent requires of us”

Sunday afternoon sees a clash between two newly-promoted sides, as HSV travel to Cologne for a meeting with 1. FC Köln. In the build-up to the game, Merlin Polzin held a press conference in which he answered questions from the media on topics such as what will be important in Sunday’s match and what ideas he might bring to the game.

Friday (31st October) was a public holiday in Hamburg, meaning Merlin Polzin’s press conference at the Volksparkstadion was a little less attended than usual. Reformation Day was still a normal working day for HSV’s players and staff – especially Polzin, who took charge of training before holding the pre-match press conference ahead of his side’s trip to face 1. FC Köln on Sunday (2nd November, 15:30 CET). HSV’s head coach discussed his potential lineup, as well as his expectations for the opponent and the match. He spoke in detail about…

…the availability of his squad: Warmed Omari is obviously still out. We’ve used the whole squad recently, especially with the DFB-Pokal game, just to keep an eye on players’ fitness and manage their workloads. Things are looking pretty good as a whole, and I expect to have everyone available for tomorrow’s final training session. We’ll have a few decisions to make with regards to the squad, as we’ve got a very strong group to choose from. We’ll stick to our approach and follow our plan, but also adapt to what the opponent requires of us.

“It’s going to be especially important that we silence the crowd early.”

…the upcoming opponent: As it’s a Lukas Kwasniok side, we can expect a different team to the one they fielded on Wednesday in the cup, and potentially a slightly different approach. Lukas always finds new ideas and ways of approaching different opponents. Köln will always defend compactly though, so it’ll be up to us to find a way to break them down. We showed in the cup that we have made progress in terms of how we play when we have the ball and that we can play well in transition. We trained intensely this week alongside having many discussions so as to prepare ourselves as well as we can to play an experienced Bundesliga side.

…his expectations for Sunday: I expect, above all else, a fantastic atmosphere. 1. FC Köln are a club with a lot of heart and passion. I was at their cup game on Wednesday against FC Bayern and got to experience that atmosphere firsthand. We did show last season though that we can hold our own there, as we won both meetings. Still, Köln are going to be very demanding, and it’s going to be especially important that we silence the crowd early and set things up for what I hope will be a very enjoyable afternoon of football.