With the international break now over, the Bundesliga is back over Easter. Head coach Heiko Herrlich wants his side to overtake opponents TSG 1899 Hoffenheim in the table with a win on Saturday (15:30 CEST) – and he also had some advice for Marco Richter.

The FCA players had two weeks during the international break to catch their breath before the decisive part of the season. “We’ve had time to train tactics, enjoyed things and had a successful friendly too,” said Marco Richter.

After that 3-1 friendly win over 1. FC Heidenheim, Augsburg are back in league action looking to taste victory against TSG 1899 Hoffenheim this time, who are one point ahead in the table. “Considering what they wanted to achieve at the start of this season, they’re definitely not where they want to be,” commented Heiko Herrlich. The FCA coach also looked back on the reverse fixture in December, which Hoffenheim won 3-1. “We effectively gifted them the game in a two-minute period after the break.”

Niederlechner out with a groin problem

Although the Augsburg coach knows how strong TSG are, the points should stay at the WWK Arena on this occasion. “They have a lot of potential in their team, score a lot of goals on the counter and are a good footballing side,” analysed Herrlich. He believes their lack of consistency this season is down to “the many problems caused by several corona infections and their busy fixture list due to playing in the Europa League.”

Nevertheless, Herrlich’s aim for the match is clear: “We want to overtake Hoffenheim in the table.” The 49-year-old, however, will be without Iago, Jan Morávek, Tim Civeja (the game has came too soon for him) and Florian Niederlechner, who has a groin problem.

Herrlich on Richter: “He’s an instinctive footballer”

Marco Richter, who scored his third goal of the season in the last home game against Borussia Mönchengladbach (3-1), has a good chance of starting tomorrow. “He’s an instinctive footballer and we don’t want to destroy that,” said Herrlich. “In certain situations, he does things that are really dangerous and that others wouldn’t do. He needs to stop giving the ball away easily – then he will be even more dangerous.”

This is advice that Richter will gladly take on board. “I think that the simple pass is often the best one and I’ll try to do that more frequently,” explained the attacker. “We’ve got some really important games in the coming weeks and we will need to give our all.” Richter will hope to contribute with more goals in these matches – all three of his goals this term have come at the WWK Arena against Schalke (2-2), Stuttgart (1-4) and Gladbach (3-1), so there’s a fair chance he will find the back of the net against Hoffenheim this weekend.

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