“Nobody stood emotionless on the pitch”

Schalke sporting director Christian Heidel underlined the fact that the team’s attitude during the 1-0 defeat to Freiburg shouldn’t be criticised: “It wasn’t like the players weren’t showing any emotion on the pitch. The team did play well. They put a lot of good crosses in, won almost 60% of their tackles and also had more possession. But we just can’t seem to score, having hit the post twice and had one goal ruled out for offside. I think that going ahead in a game would do us the world of good.”

Freiburg’s goal, scored by Florian Niederlechner in the 52nd minute, was totally against the run of play. “It was to be expected that it would be more difficult once going behind, especially due to the atmosphere in the ground. We failed to create any real chances in the second half though, partly down to Freiburg’s good defending,” said the 55-year-old.

There was also the feeling in the Freiburg camp that Schalke had been unlucky, according to Heidel. “Our counterparts from Freiburg came into our dressing room after the game and said that they had been lucky to win. I replied that the same thing happened when we won 1-0 there last season.” This was the case, as the Royal Blues won 1-0 in November 2017 through a deflected Daniel Caligiuri strike.

The most important thing now is to get over this next setback and look ahead positively. “We have a number of weeks ahead of us where we will play twice. It’s a good thing that we don’t have to wait long for our next game,” said Heidel. “When you have lost a few games in a row you need to get it in the player’s heads that we have a chance to win the next game.” Hopefully that will happen on Saturday (29/9) against 1. FSV Mainz 05 (15:30 CEST) in the VELTINS-Arena.