A month ago the situation in the Admiral Bundesliga was completely different. After the well-deserved 1-0 win at Sturm in the second round of the championship group, Salzburg were five points ahead of their rivals at the top of the table and – as always at this stage of the season – seemed to be pulling away from the rest. But the following 3:4 home defeat against Sturm in the cup semi-final heralded a turning point. Only one of four games could be won, against LASK (1:3) and now Klagenfurt (3:4) there were bitter defeats. Sturm, on the other hand, won all four of its games and comes to Wals-Siezenheim with a three-point advantage.
Even a draw would definitely help the Styrians on their way to their first championship title since 2011, their fourth overall. But playing for a draw is not an option for the guests. “Never. If you play passively against the ball, you won’t be able to move quickly with the ball. “It is not our approach to try to secure a point in Salzburg,” coach Christian Ilzer made clear. “It will depend on a lot of little things. You have to have good nerves, you need the momentum and you need good leaders with a lot of conviction in your own qualities.”
Excitement before the Bundesliga showdown
In the Bundesliga title fight there will be a showdown between Salzburg and Sturm on Sunday. Last weekend the “Bulls” and the “Blackies” changed positions in the table, and now Salzburg is the hunter. Sturm wants to make a preliminary decision in the championship race.
“Outstanding season”
Even though Salzburg is currently facing a lot of criticism, the challenge on Sunday is the greatest imaginable. “Their season isn’t bad, but ours is really outstanding,” said Ilzer, who described the away game as the “most difficult game”. “But we know that we can also win these games on our side,” said the 46-year-old, who only has to play the suspended left-back David Schnegg alongside the long-term injured Manprit Sarkaria, Kjell Scherpen and Alexandar Borkovic.
Schedule and table
Bundesliga, 29th round
Sunday, 5 p.m. (live on ORF1)
Salzburg – Sturm Graz
Red Bull Arena, SR Lechner
Possible lineups:
Salzburg: Schlager – Daniliuc, Solet, Baidoo, Guindo – Bidstrup, Gourna-Douath, Gloukh, Forson – Konate, Ratkov
Sturm: Jaros – Gazibegovic, Affengruber, Wüthrich, Lavalee – Gorenc Stankovic – Horvat, Kiteishvili, Prass – Biereth, Böving
His team is currently so strong that the seemingly impossible is now within reach. “At the beginning, I didn’t always look into confident eyes when it came to conveying the belief that I could beat Salzburg in just one game,” Ilzer remembered. “We managed to implement this idea and also be able to really, really challenge Salzburg over the course of a season.”
Salzburg is still the big favorite, Sturm is the underdog. “But we managed to keep the league giant reeling – now we have four rounds to bring him down too,” said Ilzer.
Declaration of war on Salzburg
Gazibegovic also brought newfound mental strength into the meeting. “We thought about it a few times too often last year, maybe that was the mistake that we went into the game with more pressure. “We’re just playing our game this year, we know what we can do,” explained the full-back, who Salzburg handed over to Graz in 2020 after seven years in the youth ranks. “We definitely want to become champions, you can say it now.”
In Salzburg you probably hear such announcements with mixed feelings. The fact that the “upstart” is now claiming the Bulls’ self-image for himself is certainly a sign of the fence. “The roles are now reversed,” Daniliuc stated soberly and tried to increase the pressure on his competitors. “Storm also has a lot of pressure. Now we are the hunters and we will hunt them.”
“We have something to make up for”
But psychological games alone won’t be enough for the League Croesus. “We have something to make up for,” confirmed coach Onur Cinel, who took over from the sacked Gerhard Struber two games ago. The German’s debut was quite successful with a 4-2 home win over Klagenfurt, but in the second leg on Wednesday they suffered a disastrous 3-4 away defeat – despite leading 2-0 at halftime. “The only explanation” for Daniliuc was “a mentality thing. We brought the playfulness with us. But that’s exactly what we will do differently on Sunday,” said the 22-year-old.
Cinel worked on exactly this mental aspect in the few days before the hit. “A lot of it goes through individual and team discussions. “It’s a short period of time, with the advantage that you can immediately show that you can do it better,” says Cinel. His clear demand to the team: “It must be clear that we want to win – in every duel, in every aerial duel, with conviction in every pass and every shot.” Cinel was aware of the danger of the storm. “They are an extremely intense team, with a high level of willingness in all phases of the game, and they do that very consistently.”
Dropouts in what was actually a very stable defense cost valuable points recently. “There have been too many goals conceded in the last few games. But this is not just a defensive issue. The game itself wasn’t good. “It was mainly about attacking the ball, but also the phases in which we had to switch in both directions,” said Cinel. Due to the unnecessary fifth yellow card for Strahinja Pavlovic, he is missing a regular player against Graz who can also lead the way.
