The German Bundesliga club Werder Bremen will have to do without midfielder Romano Schmid for several weeks. The 22-year-old from Styria suffered a slight tear in the inner ligament of his knee during the training camp in Murcia.
The Bremen team confirmed this on Tuesday before the return flight to Germany. The ÖFB team player is one of the regular players at Werder. His injury a week and a half before the first game of the new year is a hard blow.
Bremen continue the league on January 21 at 1. FC Köln. “You can see that when three or four important guys aren’t on the pitch, things get difficult and a bit thin for us,” said coach Ole Werner.
“Our squad is not huge. And in this squad we have a lot of guys who haven’t played that often in the Bundesliga, or in some cases not at all. So we can’t say that we have 21 outfield players all fighting for a place in the starting XI. That is definitely not the case with us.”
Meet Laimer and Onisiwo
On the other hand, there was a sense of achievement for other ÖFB legionnaires. Konrad Laimer scored a brace (74′, 97′) in RB Leipzig’s 15-0 win at the training camp in Abu Dhabi against second division side Atletico Arabia from Dubai, with the game being played in four 30-minute periods. Mainz striker Karim Onisiwo scored a goal (81st) in the 5-1 win in Marbella against FC Luzern. The game was played twice over 60 minutes.
That was also the case in VfL Bochum’s 1-1 draw against Grasshoppers Zurich in Jerez. Kevin Stöger was able to show with a free kick goal (7th). In the duel between Borussia Dortmund and Fortuna Düsseldorf (5:1), all eyes were on Sebastien Haller. The BVB striker, who was diagnosed with a testicular tumor last summer, made his debut in Dortmund’s dress from the 74th minute as a result of two operations. The 28-year-old Ivorian was signed by Ajax Amsterdam at the start of the season for 31.5 million euros.
