Dimitrios Grammozis: The lads need the will to get into dangerous areas

“It’s a home game, and we want to win it,” said the 43-year-old, stressing that the game is by no means an easy one, despite 17th-placed Sandhausen’s rescheduled 3-1 loss to FC St. Pauli on Wednesday night. “Those who know this league know how difficult every game is and how all our opponents dig in against us.”

Get back to creating more chances

It will be important to return to the attacking form the team had in September and October, said Grammozis. “The attitude and work-rate in Bremen were positives, but we know that we still have room to improve in terms of technical play and creating chances,” he continued, adding: “We have already shown time and again this season that we can do better than we have done before.” The squad spent time on positional play in training this week, amongst other things, in order to be more dangerous in front of goal.

As ever, Grammozis has analysed his side’s upcoming opponent: “Sandhausen have been unlucky in a lot of their defeats this season,” he said, the only anomaly being their 6-1 reverse against SV Darmstadt 98 at the start of October. “Apart from that game, there are many games which could have had positive results for Sandhausen. Alois Schwartz has given his team a lot of stability,” said Grammozis on his counterpart, who took the position a little more than two months ago. “We need to be 100% focused,” said the Royal Blues’ head coach, emphasising: “I’m sure that we’ll get chances and be able to convert them. It’s important that the lads have the will to get into dangerous areas. These are areas which can hurt, where the hardest tackles fly in, but they are also the places you score goals in.”

Not much has changed since the game against Werder in regard to the squad. Michael Langer is still recovering from his ACL tear, and Salif Sané is back in light training following muscular issues, but is not an option for Saturday’s squad. Darko Churlinov is a doubt. The North Macedonia international returned from representing his country with a small shoulder issue which kept him out of the game last weekend. A decision will be made as to whether he can feature against Sandhausen after the final training session of the week.