All about the next opponent: Interview with Kiel fans Chris and Falafel

After the Cham­pi­ons League gla­mour in Turin and Munich, the Bun­des­li­ga rou­ti­ne awaits at home on Satur­day. The Bun­des­li­ga new­co­mer Hol­stein Kiel will be the guest. Chris and Fal­a­fel tell us how things are going with the “Storks.”

With the Red Stri­pe: How do you rate the sea­son so far? Are you satis­fied, or did you expect more?

Chris/Falafel: Hi, and thanks for invi­ting us to share our thoughts here. Of cour­se, we’­re dis­ap­poin­ted, but let’s be honest: we didn’t expect any­thing dif­fe­rent. It’s the so-cal­led “fight for sur­vi­val.” What’s frus­t­ra­ting are the games against Hof­fen­heim, Wolfs­burg, and Bochum – so-cal­led “six-point games” against imme­dia­te table neigh­bors and oppon­ents alre­a­dy mark­ed as direct com­pe­ti­ti­on in the lower third of the league. Hol­stein often has pha­ses whe­re the team per­forms very well and even sets the tone. But then the qua­li­ty and stami­na aren’t enough, and indi­vi­du­al mista­kes creep in, which oppon­ents take full advan­ta­ge of. You can feel it; you tell yours­elf, “The boys can do it; Hol­stein isn’t far off.” As they say, hope dies last.

How do you rate Kiel’s chan­ces of stay­ing in the league?

Not good, espe­ci­al­ly if they keep con­ce­ding about three goals per game on avera­ge. No team can sus­tain that. If they want to stay up, they’ll need to streng­then through trans­fers in the win­ter. The focus should be on cen­tral defen­se, ano­ther right-back to reli­e­ve Timo Becker, and a hig­her-qua­li­ty cen­ter for­ward. Other­wi­se, I’d rate the team che­mis­try as very good, and the boys just need more expe­ri­ence to hand­le cer­tain situa­tions bet­ter.

Kiel won the last two encoun­ters back when both teams were in the second league. Stutt­gart was the favo­ri­te back then as well. How likely is it for Kiel to pull off ano­ther win?

The situa­ti­on is com­ple­te­ly dif­fe­rent now, with dif­fe­rent play­ers on both sides. VfB Stutt­gart cle­ar­ly holds the favo­ri­te role. Kiel has to tre­at every Bun­des­li­ga game as a final and give 120% just to have a chan­ce.

Seve­ral coa­ching talents like Tim Wal­ter, Mar­kus Anfang, Ole Wer­ner, and now Mar­cel Rapp have had their breakth­roughs in Kiel. Is this a coin­ci­dence, or is the­re a sys­tem behind it?

In Kiel, things are quiet (also in the media sen­se), and the club offi­ci­als can calm­ly assess coa­ches and coa­ching pro­jects to find the right fit. There’s no pres­su­re to make hasty decis­i­ons to “plea­se peo­p­le.” Addi­tio­nal­ly, the coach is given exten­si­ve trust, and even during tough times, the club manage­ment con­ti­nues to ful­ly sup­port him.

How would you descri­be your style of play? What are the strengths and weak­ne­s­ses?

Rapp has a clear iden­ti­ty and acts accor­ding to strict prin­ci­ples. Fol­lo­wing his tac­ti­cal role model Gian Pie­ro Gas­pe­ri­ni, he demands tac­ti­cal disci­pli­ne from his play­ers, along with a cer­tain level of fle­xi­bi­li­ty on the field. Holstein’s attack­ing press par­ti­cu­lar­ly stands out to me. Shuto Machi­no and vete­ran Lewis Holt­by – who, unfort­u­na­te­ly, will miss the VfB match due to inju­ry – excel here as the most meti­cu­lous for­ward and vocal coor­di­na­tor. In pro­mi­sing pres­sing situa­tions, the mid­field pushes up to neu­tra­li­ze key oppo­nent posi­ti­ons through smart posi­tio­ning. Unfort­u­na­te­ly, we haven’t capi­ta­li­zed on this much this sea­son and have even been punis­hed for the gaps this crea­tes with line-brea­king balls from world-class play­ers.

We still see the build-up as a weak­ne­ss. The cen­ter had to be res­truc­tu­red after our for­mer cap­tain Phil­ipp San­der left. New addi­ti­ons Magnus Knud­sen and Armin Gigo­vic have brought dif­fe­rent pro­files that didn’t exist in the pre­vious sea­son. Both think ver­ti­cal­ly, with Knud­sen pro­ving to be quick-thin­king and resistant to pres­sing, while Gigo­vic stands out for his deep runs, which nota­b­ly led to an hono­ra­ry goal against Bay­ern. Howe­ver, you can see that the play­ers and pro­files don’t yet har­mo­ni­ze at the requi­red level. Mis­read runs or slo­wing the game under oppo­si­ti­on pres­su­re can be frus­t­ra­ting, but I think it’s all a mat­ter of expe­ri­ence. Over time, the under­stan­ding bet­ween them will grow, the­se kinds of mista­kes will be mini­mi­zed, and the play will beco­me more flu­id. The ques­ti­on remains, though, whe­ther the much-nee­ded sur­vi­val won’t be out of reach by then.

Who has been Kiel’s play­er of the sea­son for you?

The sea­son isn’t that old yet, but my stand­out play­ers so far are my “My Guy,” Shuto Machi­no, who is in gre­at form, as well as the ques­tionable trans­fers from FK Ros­tov in Rus­sia, Armin Gigo­vic, and Magnus Knud­sen.

What’s your pre­dic­tion and fee­ling for the game?

We’re, of cour­se, roo­ting for Kiel with a pre­dic­tion of 2–3, but rea­li­sti­cal­ly, I’m expec­ting a clear 3–1 for VfB.

Thank you!

Note: This inter­view was trans­la­ted from Ger­man via ChatGPT

Pic­tu­re: © Selim Sudheimer/Getty Images

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