SC Freiburg

The two sides find themselves in very different situations in the league table – while the Wolves’ place in next season’s top-flight is yet to be confirmed, SC are fighting for a coveted European place. “If we can win, we’ll find ourselves in a very good position to be travelling around Europe again next season. We’ve had some wonderful trips in the last few years,” recalls Streich.

SC made one change from the 1-0 win in Darmstadt, with Roland Sallai suspended having picked up five yellow cards and replaced in the starting eleven by Höler, who himself was coming back from suspension. As in Darmstadt, SC started in a 3-4-3 formation with Yannik Keitel in the middle of a back-three.

SC are, however, winless in their last five at home. “It’s obviously annoying that we’ve only won once at home in the second half of the season. But we’ve hosted some decent opponents and we’ll be happy to finally win at home again.” Freiburg have a strong recent record against the 05ers, and are unbeaten in the last five meetings between the sides. Roland Sallai is suspended for Sunday’s match after picking up his fifth yellow card of the season last time out against Darmstadt, while Lucas Höler is available for selection after serving a suspension of his own.

The anniversary shirt was designed in collaboration with outfitters 11teamsports and NIKE, and comes packaged in a special gift box. The striped design, in the team colours of white and red, alongside the embroidered SC crest and anniversary logo give the shirt a distinctly retro look. The back of the shirt features the slogan “Geschichte weiterschreiben” (“Keep writing history”) in the neck area. The red “SC Freiburg” lettering is also a prominent feature of the design. The exclusive printing on the back is reminiscent of the numbers worn by the SC side who won promotion to the Bundesliga in 1993, and is available for an additional €15. The design is completed by a depiction of a forested landscape in the lower back area.

Patrick Osterhage played for SV Werder Bremen and Borussia Dortmund’s youth teams. He captained BVB to...

For the fourth edition of this Bundesliga match-up, the Freiburg coaching staff made two changes to the starting line-up. Vincenzo Grifo started in place of Merlin Röhl, and Roland Sallai replaced the suspended Lucas Höler in the starting XI. 

Photo: Achim Keller

SC, who set up with the same starting XI that beat Borussia Mönchengladbach last weekend, had barely even touched the ball when Leipzig found the back of the net for the first time. Amadou Haidara opened the scoring for the visitors just two minutes after kick off after Leipzig stormed through the Freiburg defence, and continued to pose a threat to the opposition goal from then on. RBL were quick in transition and counter attacked at pace, so it’s no surprise that the side have scored a league best of eleven goals from counter attacks so far this season.

Michael Müller joined Freiburg’s academy as a youth player in 2006 and was part of the team that won the German U19 title in 2008. Müller was the first team’s third-choice goalkeeper in the 2008/09 season and played for the second team in the fourth division. He went on to play for VfL Wolfsburg’s U23s and 1. FC Saarbrücken. He returned to SC in 2014 and was the goalkeeping coach for the academy and the U23s. The 34-year-old has been the first team’s goalkeeping coach since the 2022/23 season. 

“Those in charge at Freiburg approached me pretty early on and made me feel good from the start. I already knew then that I wanted to go down this path,” Erin Dinkçi said. “I believe I’ve just got a flow and I’d like to take this with me to Freiburg. I’ve played here with Werder previously and things went well at the ground. I’m really looking forward to this atmosphere.”