Soccer

Bundesliga, Week 23 preview and fixtures: Bayern Munich look to add to Schalke’s misery

Schalke were pummeled by Real Madrid midweek in the Champions League, and their reward is a trip to face Bayern Munich.

Feb 28, 2014, 6:00 AM UTC

Juergen Schwarz

The Bundesliga is back this weekend with a match between the first and fourth place teams in Saturday’s featured match, but the two sides could not be heading into the match on more different form. After being thumped midweek, Schalke head to the Allianz Arena to face Bayern Munich, and it could get just as ugly.

Heading into the match Bayern are coming directly off of a 2-0 victory in London against Arsenal and a 4-0 victory against Hannover last weekend. Oh, yeah, they were also off midweek. Schalke put together a disappointing 0-0 draw against Mainz last weekend and were on the wrong end of a 6-1 pounding at the hands of Real Madrid.

Injuries are becoming less and less of an issue for FC Bayern. Franck Ribery and Holger Badstuber are the only ones set to miss out on this weekend's match. Schalke, on the other hand, aren't doing well in this department. Felipe Santana, Christian Clemens, Dennis Aogo, Atsuto Uchida, Marco Höger and Jan Kirchhoff are definitely out for this game, while other players such as Kevin Prince Boateng, Sead Kolasinac and Roman Neustädter are doubtful after picking up injuries against Real Madrid.

Eesh. Things could get ugly for Die Königsblauen.

Sami Hyppiä‘s side has a lot of questions to answer when Mainz visit. The biggest being, quite simply, ‘what is wrong with this team?’. Since Stefan Kießling’s dip in form the team has fallen well off the pace they were on earlier in the season. They’ve lost 7 of their last 9 matches in all competitions. This is not a good thing. Thomas Tuchel has Mainz fighting hard each and every week, and they look poised to make a strong push for a Europa League spot as the year comes to a close. If they can stay healthy, the teams ahead of them have a fight on their hands.