Schalke vs Augsburg preview

Posted Friday, October 31, 2014 by PA

Roberto Di Matteo returns to the sanctuary of the Arena AufSchalke on Friday with the warning that his perfect record on home soil will be put to the test by Augsburg.

Manager Di Matteo won his first two games in charge of the Royal Blues, both in front of their own fans.

Last weekend, he experienced defeat for the first time at Bayer Leverkusen, which is why he will be glad to get back home again this Friday night, even though he is not taking anything for granted in Gelsenkirchen.

"I've seen lots of Augsburg games and they really do make life hard for you," said the Italian. "They're going to be a hard nut to crack."

Both clubs have had plenty of time to prepare for the match, with their respective first-round DFB-Pokal eliminations meaning they had a normal training week.

"On the one hand, it's a shame we weren't able to measure ourselves up to other teams in the DFB-Pokal, but on the other hand it's good for me as a coach to have a few normal days so we can work on and improve specific things in training," said Di Matteo.

"From this point of view, I'm glad we had a quiet week to work and we were able to prepare well for Friday."

It was a welcome breather ahead of a challenging week for Schalke, who follow the clash with Augsburg with a trip to Sporting Lisbon in the Champions League on Tuesday.

Victory in Portugal would put them on course for qualification from Group G whereas defeat would throw the group wide open.

Augsburg have no such issues to concern them and they can focus fully on Friday's clash and picking up the three points which would take them into the top six and leave Schalke in their wake.

"After beating Freiburg, we now have the wind between our sails for this trip," said their coach Markus Weinzierl on fcaugsburg.de.

"We've got a good chance to get the points this Friday. We want to give it everything and deliver our best performance.

"That way, we would still be ahead of Schalke in the standings."