FC St. Pauli is defying all odds, sending combative messages to Schalke 04 before the next promotion duel on Saturday despite the corona wave in the team and definitely wants to compete. After the bad news of the past few days, there are encouraging signals.
Good news is not only welcome in the current brown and white state of emergency – it is really longed for. And so what has been routinely noted for months is now acknowledged with great relief and genuine joy: there were no positive corona tests on Tuesday.
Negative is positive! That has never been more true than it is now. There is no guarantee that the corona wave has stopped in the team, but two days in a row without a new infection give hope.
St. Pauli: Hartel back in training
This also applies to Marcel Hartel’s return to the training ground. The midfielder, who was one of the 13 missing players the day before, was back on the pitch and is therefore not one of the ten confirmed cases of Corona so far, which, with the exception of Philipp Ziereis, who tested positive on Friday, are not named by the club.
Sports director Andreas Bornemann made it clear on Tuesday that St. Pauli wants to play at Schalke. “As of now, we see no reason to apply to the DFL to cancel the game.” On the one hand, St. Pauli currently has enough players available in accordance with the Corona regulations in the game regulations. On the other hand, a transfer is not the goal at all. “We don’t want to play games so we don’t have to compete. We will not melt into self-pity either, but want to field a good, competitive team if possible.”
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In addition to the DFL, Bremen, Darmstadt and HSV also rely on it. The Kiezklub hopes that players who are currently positive can test themselves out of isolation after seven days and take part in the penultimate game of the season. The best chances are currently with Ziereis, but also with the other nine professionals whose PCR test was positive on Sunday after there had been various conspicuous quick tests on Saturday.
For example, anyone who already had the first symptoms on Friday or Saturday could, at best, be released from quarantine by the responsible health department in the Mitte district next Thursday or Friday according to the corona rules currently in force in Hamburg – including a subsequent cardiological examination by the team doctors. In this way, players could still make it into the squad for Schalke.
Bornemann: Don’t take any risks
“We are confident that we will succeed, but there are no guarantees,” says Bornemann. The health of the players always comes first. “With all our ambition and our own ambitions to still be able to make it, we won’t risk anything.”
This also applies to everyday training. The currently healthy players test themselves every morning when they get up, drive to training already changed, are tested again before they step onto the pitch and take a shower at home after training.
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In turn, the infected professionals are visited and tested daily by the medical department to track the course of the infection.
After falling to fifth place in the table with three points behind a direct promotion and relegation place, St. Pauli on Schalke is reaching for the last straw.
“We aim to play a good game there and there is no reason to feel sorry for ourselves now,” explains Bornemann and says almost imploringly: “The game is a huge opportunity for the team and for each individual, on To be able to show up in a sold-out stadium on Saturday evening, to compete and to prevent the free beer tap going up in the arena after the game and everyone hugging each other cheering.” Schalke is the “chance to make another sign as a group put”.
Nobody knows what this group will look like. The squad nomination becomes a time and test game.
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