Hoffenhein face ‘unfathomable’ Bayern

Hoffenheim will become the latest club to try and halt the Bayern Munich juggernaut when they meet in the Bundesliga this weekend.

The Bavarians have won ten games in a row and their goalkeeper Manuel Neuer could make it 1,000 minutes without conceding a goal if he shuts out Hoffenheim until at least the 72nd minute on Saturday

Hoffenheim coach Holger Stanislawski is in no doubt who the favourites are ahead of the match, branding the league leaders “incredible” and “unfathomable”, but he nevertheless remains cautiously optimistic about his side’s chances.

“I believe that Bayern will win the league by a mile,” he said told a press conference. They are in an incredible condition and that makes them unfathomable at the moment.

“Nevertheless, we want to beat the future German champions,” he said. “This is a chance for our young team to see how far it has come and I am intrigued to see what sort of a condition we are in.”

Werder Bremen would be the first club looking to take advantage of any Bayern slip-up and their director of sport Klaus Allofs has given Hoffenheim some encouragement.

“I don’t think that the other 17 Bundesliga clubs need to raise the white flag in front of Bayern,” he said after his side’s 2-1 win over Hertha Berlin last weekend left the in second place, just two points adrift of the leaders.

Bremen travel to north Germany rivals Hannover on Sunday, by which time they will know whether a win will take them top.

Third place belongs to Borussia Monchengladbach, the only side to have defeated Bayern since May with a 1-0 win at the Allianz Arena on the opening day of the season.

Monchengladbach are also only two points adrift of the summit ahead of their trip to Freiburg on Saturday.

Elsewhere, defending champions Borussia Dortmund will be looking to put their midweek Champions League misery in Marseille behind them as they host winless Augsburg, while Bayer Leverkusen, who fared better in Europe with a win over Genk, host Wolfsburg.

Nurnberg entertain Mainz and Hertha Berlin welcome in-form Cologne to the Olympiastadion, while Huub Stevens’ first match in charge of Schalke comes against managerless Hamburg at the HSV-Arena.

The weekend action kicks off with Stuttgart in action on a Friday night for the third week in a row, with Bruno Labbadia’s side heading to Kaiserslautern.

Credit: http://soccernet.espn.go.com

Tags: Bayern Munich, Hoffenheim

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