Eintracht Frankfurt - FC Schalke 04

Statistic:

- Since October 2005 meet these two team each other 17 times, Frankfurt could only win 1.
- In April 2013 at home with 1-0, record 1-6-10.
- Eintracht is without a BL win since 6 Rounds (0-4-2) The longest run since 2013 (10).
- Schalke 04 is unbeaten in the last 5 BL games (3-2-0).
- In 20 BL games this season with Frankfurt was entertaining pur, overall 79 goals / average 4 !!
- Schalke's success comes from the defensive minded play from Coach Di Matteo.
- With only 36% ball possession 2015 who is the lowest amount of all teams.

We have a match between two sides with a big different style of play. The home side stands for spectacle and a lot of goals in each way, on the other side stands a team who is only defensive minded and try to defend the whole match while up front they hope for one good action to get a narrow win in the end.

The sign for this encounter is not the best above all Frankfurt has a lot of problems in their defensive zone. Nevertheless they had the problems already before this encounter but they will not be solved these days anyway. With DEF Zambrano they have one guy suspended while his partner in central back Anderson has problems with illness this week. Also both central midfield players Hasebe and Stendera trained only individual under the week and they hoped to get back into team training on Thursday. If not, Coach Schaaf has to replace 4 guys of his weak defensive part additional what give them not more stability right now. Therefore the focus was on the defensive work from all 11 players and who to be more compact and give the opponent not so much space and make less mistakes under this training week. But the important question is, can they solve this in one week without some of their starters? Coach Schaaf does not think to change his style of play as he mentioned already that “Not the teams with the most conceded goals were relegated recently, but the teams who scored less”. This means that Frankfurt are far away from this scenario as they have a great offensive line with Meier, Aigner, Seferovic and the standards from midfielder Stendera.

Today’s opponent Schalke 04 plays more and more awful above all the offensive play is not the best and they are only focused to be as compact as they can and are more and more defensive minded. This is the style of Coach Matteo who has implemented it more and more. Some good news as with Prince Boateng, Uchida and Sam are some back in training and can help to give the offensive play more power. Despite these guys a lot of players are still injured and top striker Huntelaar is still suspended. He has to work with the guys who are available and try to have the best possible success. He does well with this style and of course he does not change much for the hard match in Frankfurt. But a bit more risk in their offensive actions and in some period of the game would be appreciated.

This can be an entertaining game although Schalke is very defensive minded but Frankfurt plays very open and with the problems in their defense it is a good choice to go for goals here. I am sure that Frankfurt is able to score against this Schalke and on the other side they are always good to concede. The facts and problems are there and I am sure that Coach Schaaf try to push and control the game and open more and more. 

Recommend Bet: OVER 2,75 @ 1,85 (3 Units)