“It’ll be a very intensive game” | OneFootball

Dino Toppmöller on Hugo Larsson, Oscar Højlund and the upcoming game in Berlin.

Head coach Dino Toppmöller on …

… his expectations of the game: “We know what kind of match to expect. Union are back to their old selves under Bo Svensson. It’ll be a very intensive game. We were able to give one or two players a breather on Thursday. We’ll have to take the game as it comes – it’ll be very intensive with a lot of tackles. We’ll have to compete with them physically and at the same time try and bring our footballing quality to bear. I’m sure both teams will operate with a high press and will try to put the opposition under pressure early on. Having said that, we’ll also have to find solutions to get past a deep-lying defence. We’ll have to be wide awake from the first second and swing the game our way.”

… the short amount of time after a midweek game: “We didn’t pat ourselves on the back for two weeks after the Bayern game, and we won’t mope around now either after not hitting our stride against Riga. There’s not a lot of time to analyse the game in any great depth. We’re in a challenging period at the moment with fixtures every three days or so. We need to find the right balance in terms of rotating the squad. Competition for places is very important in that regard because it means everyone is ready to go.”

… Hugo Larsson: “Hugo Larsson's activeness, with his runs, the effort to go for the second balls and his presence in the box, benefits us a lot. We had a very different energy after he came on yesterday. The fact he scored the winning goal was maybe indicative.”

… Mario Götze: “He’s an unbelievably good footballer. He’s had to do a lot of defensive work in some games recently, and he’s very reliable in closing down spaces. Obviously we prefer it if we have the ball more on the pitch – he prefers it too. He’ll have a positive impact on our game in the coming weeks.”

… Oscar Højlund: “Oscar Højlund should be partially integrated in the first week of the next international break. Normally, he'd then be ready for a place in the squad 10 to 14 days later.”