After an incredible second round in the DFB-Pokal, Saarbrucken will be hoping to claim another Bundesliga scalp when they take on Eintracht Frankfurt in the last 16 at Ludwigsparkstadion on Wednesday evening.
The hosts are currently in 11th place in the third tier of German club football, while the visitors are seventh in the Bundesliga, although they have hit a bit of a difficult patch leading up to this encounter.
Match preview
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Saarbrucken were the talk of the town when they secured their place in the last 16 of this competition by beating the German giants Bayern Munich 2-1 at this venue at the start of last month.
That result saw them record a piece of history as they kept their unbeaten home record against Bayern intact (W2 D2), which is something that no other team in the top flight has been able to do against the Bundesliga Champions.
Thomas Muller, who was making his 677th senior appearance for the Bavarians, opened the scoring inside the first 20 minutes, but Die Molschder dug in, and Patrick Sontheimer pulled them level before Marcel Gaus smashed past Manuel Neuer to send the home crowd into raptures.
Since then, Rudiger Ziehl's side also experienced an uptick in their league performances, and come into this match having lost just one match in their last seven, while they are unbeaten in the last five in all competitions.
Saarbrucken failed to make it past the qualifiers for this competition in the last three seasons but did reach the final four back in the 2019-20 season before Bayer Leverkusen knocked them out.
Meanwhile, Eintracht Frankfurt will see this as the perfect opportunity to get back to winning ways following a poor run of results both in their domestic league as well as in Europe.
The Eagles suffered their third consecutive defeat over the weekend, beaten 2-1 by Augsburg, which followed another 2-1 defeat by PAOK in the Europa League, which means they will need to compete in the playoffs to progress.
Still, Dino Toppmoller's side are heavily fancied to win this match, and the new boss will be aiming to go one step further than his predecessor Oliver Glasner, who took Eintracht to the final of this competition last season.
Perhaps the biggest task for the visitors here will be to avoid complacency, which many accused Bayern Munich of in the last round, and provided they do not fall into the same trap, SGE should be the ones progressing to the last eight.
Team News
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Saarbrucken have been without the services of centre-forwards Sebastian Jacob and Patrick Schmidt for the majority of this season, which should see Fabio Di Michele Sanchez continue to lead the line.
Kai Brunker will be hoping to join Sanchez at the top end of the pitch, while Lukas Boeder, Manuel Zeitz, and Bone Uaferro are expected to remain unchanged as the backline.
The visitors, on the other hand, have several notable absentees, with Ellyes Skhiri being the most recent addition to the casualty list due to a thigh injury.
Timothy Chandler (calf), Jens Petter Hauge (back), Noel Futkeu (hip), Sebastian Rode (calf) and Mehdi Loune (ACL) have all been ruled out of this encounter through injuries as well.
Saarbrucken possible starting lineup:
Schreiber; Boeder, Zeitz, Uaferro; Sontheimer; Rizzuto, Gaus, Naifi, Rabihic; Brunker, Sanchez
Eintracht Frankfurt possible starting lineup:
Trapp; Buta, Tuta, Pacho, Max; Ebimbe, Skhiri, Larsson; Knauff, Marmoush, Chaibi
We say: Saarbrucken 1-2 Eintracht Frankfurt
Saarbrucken pulled off an incredible victory in the last round, but that would have sent shockwaves through the remaining teams in the competition, who are likely to ensure they do not take this team lightly. In the case of Eintracht Frankfurt, they desperately need a positive result after losing three in a row, and we feel they will be able to get the job done in this one.
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