The footballers of SK Slovan Bratislava want to achieve a result on the ground of the Danish FC Midtjylland, which will give them a good starting position before the home rematch of the Champions League playoffs.
Photo: ČTK / imago sportfotodienst / IMAGO
Slovan Bratislava captain Vladimír Weiss Jr. will lead the team in the Champions League playoff double-header.
“Belasí” reached the gates of the main stage of the prestigious competition after 10 years. The opening duel of the play off is scheduled for Wednesday at 21:00 at the stadium in Herning.
Rematch will take place a week later at Tehelno poli. The Slovak champion is already guaranteed at least participation in the group stage of the European League.
Slovan is facing an extremely demanding opponent, whose philosophy is mainly based on young players, as the average age of Midtjylland’s squad is 23.9 years.
More than two-thirds of the team are made up of legionnaires, with 20-year-old attacking players Franculino worth €7.5m and Dario Osorio (€7m) standing out. Slovan will also be threatened by Adam Buksa, who played for Poland at the EC in Germany.
Midtjylland started in the 2nd preliminary round, in which they first eliminated the outsider UE Santa Coloma from Andorra (3:0, 1:0) and in the next preliminary round they dealt with Ferencváros Budapest (2:0, 1:1). The Slovan cabin is also aware of the strength of the Danish champion.
“They have very good players, they are fast and agile. We definitely have to be careful about everything in a match like this. We have to be focused for the whole 90 minutes so that we have something to play for at home. We want to bring home something positive, and I think that when it’s open until the rematch, we can handle it in front of our people,” said winger Róbert Mak before the flight.
Slovan started the European cup journey with a “mandatory trip” against North Macedonian Struga (4:2, 2:1). This was followed by a confrontation against the Slovenian NK Celje, which culminated in a home victory in the rematch (5:0).
The team of coach Vladimír Weiss st. was able to eliminate APOEL Nicosia in the 3rd preliminary round, which did not beat goalkeeper Dominik Takáč even once in the double match. Due to this, Slovan became the only team that made it to the playoffs only from the 1st preliminary round.
“We are looking forward to the match and we know that we will meet a team that has the quality to play in the Champions League. We want to make it difficult for them and try for a miracle. Midtjylland is definitely the favorite in this double-header and you have to take it realistically.
However, we have come a long way, we are two matches away from fulfilling our big dream and bringing a dream competition,” said assistant coach Boris Kitka and directed all attention to the important first part of the progress math:
“It will be important for us to be able to win a result that will give us a chance for revenge. At home we know we’ve played a lot of crazy matches and we can break them. Everything will depend from the first duel.”
In the analysis of the opponent, the implementation team focused on the style of play that Midtjylland presents itself. In addition to aggressive and pressure football, the team from Herning also has another weapon.
“They have very good standard situations, they play atypically long car throw-ins with a central defender. This was one of the components that we had to go through in the training process.
Sometimes there are 15 such situations per match. We know that they play in a system with four defenders with two classic forwards. They have very smart wings in the offensive phase,” stated Weiss’s assistant.
Slovan can already count on the new striker Idjessi Metsok, who strengthened the team on the day of the flight to Denmark and should appear on the official roster. However, coaches currently rely on players who have been with the team longer.
“Technically, it should be prosecuted, it travels with us. He is an alternative to the top, even if he was very little with the team. That’s why I rather think that we will be based on what we had at our disposal,” commented Kitka to the 22-year-old finisher, who came on loan from Viktoria Plzeň.
“Belasí” can imitate the three Slovak clubs that played in the main phase of the LM in the era of independence. In the 1997/98 season, 1. FC Košice was the first club in Slovakia to do so.
The journey of Artmedia Petržalek from the year 2005/06 under the leadership of Vladimír Weiss Sr., the current helmsman of Slovan, is also memorable. She last played in the most prestigious club competition MŠK Žilina in the 2010/11 edition.
The trio of teams featured in the group stage with four teams. From the current season, it will be replaced by a league with 36 teams, and the number of confrontations will increase from six to eight.
Source: sportweb.pravda.sk
