Frank Kramer: Work hard on the finer details in Mittersill

The fact that the Royal Blues are travelling to Austria with a 3-1 defeat against Meppen behind them is not something to be overestimated, said Frank Kramer: “Following three weeks of pre-season filled with fitness and physical work, we were missing a bit of freshness. You could see that through our lack of precision at both ends, in the final yards of both defence and attack – we were poor a number of times,” said S04’s head coach following the 90 minutes against SV Meppen.

Hohe Tauern National Park with the perfect conditions to prepare

At this early stage of preparations, it was clear that S04’s opponents had had two more weeks of preparation than them. Despite that though, Kramer made clear that “we needed to defend much better to prevent the goals we conceded. This is definitely the right time to go on a training camp to work on the finer details, both in defence and attack.”

Austria will host S04 in the finest conditions. The team will once again be staying in Schloss Mittersill, and as in five previous pre-season camps, will train in the Hohe Tauern National Park, on the home turf of the local football club.

Two friendlies on the cards

Alongside numerous training sessions, the Royal Blues will take on two clubs from Italy’s Serie A in friendlies at the training camp. Wednesday July 13th sees S04 play US Salernitana in Wörgl (18:00 CEST), before the team faces Udinese four days later on Sunday July 17th. The friendly against Udinese will be played in Mittersill, with the exact kick-off time to be announced soon.

Whilst the camp will of course be used for sporting improvement, Frank Kramer also sees the trip to Austria as a chance to grow closer together as a team. “At the training camp, we’ll be together as a team for an entire week, much longer than the few hours of a normal training day. That means we can get to know each other even better, and get closer to one another.”