Hannover 96 vs Eintracht Frankfurt preview - Cup flops look for league boost

Posted Friday, October 31, 2014 by PA

Hannover and Eintracht Frankfurt will both be looking to overcome midweek cup disappointments when they meet at the Niedersachsenstadion on Saturday.

Hannover were on the receiving end of a major upset in the DFB-Pokal, going down at second-division Aalen, while Frankfurt's loss to Borussia Monchengladbach, while similarly painful, was at least more predictable.

Hannover's defeat has put pressure on coach Tayfun Korkut, whose side's 1-0 win at Borussia Dortmund last weekend appears to have already been forgotten by club president Martin Kind.

"There's no continuity in our performances," he told the Bild newspaper. "The coach and director of sport have a duty.

"They have a duty to give a new direction to this team. The team is what we've got, and with a team like this, we should be reaching our goals."

Kind set the target of a top-10 finish with the chance of challenging for a place in Europe as the objective for the season, and with one route into the Europa League now closed following their elimination from the cup, the league has gained an even greater importance.

Nevertheless, Kind has also shown understanding for his club's recent inconsistencies.

"We've had an extraordinary injury situation and I've got to pay huge respect to the coach, who has never complained once and used that as an excuse," he added.

Frankfurt have been more consistent with their results, although not in a way they would have liked after slumping to three consecutive defeats at the hands of Paderborn, Stuttgart and Monchengladbach.

They still trail seventh-placed Hannover by just a point, though, and according to Marco Russ, their form is not concerning the team too much.

"We're not panicking," he said in the Frankfurter Allgemeine newspaper. "We're not letting the media discussion affect us.

"We know that we've got to do a lot of things much better and we've got a lot of work to do, and it doesn't help the situation that a lot of players are unavailable."

Haris Seferovic has added his name to that list due to suspension, although he could be ruled out for even longer after falling badly on his shoulder.