Schalke 04 vs Hoffenheim - German Bundesliga

. Schalke 04 vs Hoffenheim
Bundesliga : Round 11
Date : 29 October 2011
Stadium : Veltins-Arena, Gelsenkirchen

Schalke 04 hosts Hoffenheim in the Bundesliga on Saturday afternoon. Schalke lies only four points behind Bayern on the 3rd position of the table and needs a victory to stay in touch. But Hoffenheim is an vigorous opponent, has lost only once against Schalke so far.

Schalke 04 is doing very well since Huub Stevens has become new coach a month ago. Three of four matches were won in Bundesliga. Also in Europa League Schalke won twice, as in German Cup in Karlsruhe on Wednesday. Just the last match at home against Kaiserslautern was surprisingly lost 1:2, which shows that this team hosts many very young and inexperienced players. Last Sunday, when Schalke won 1:0 in Leverkusen, the defence seemed very solid, usually a typical trait of coach Stevens, but also due to a strong performance of defensive midfielder Jeramine Jones, who prevailed on that position under Stevens. Schalke is not the most reliable team at home (3-0-2).

Hoffenheim has quite a lot of quality in the team and is always a dangerous opponent. They had some striking problems recently, scored only a single goal in the last four Bundesliga matches. But top striker Ibisevic has returned from an injury, he scored the wining goal against Mönchengladbach (1:0) last Saturday. Also on Tuesday the team was able to score again. After fallen behind 0:1 at home against Köln in German Cup, they turned the match into a 2:1 victory. Away from home Hoffenheim lost three times in Bundesliga, but was successful in Augsburg (2:0) and Mainz (4:0).

Head to Head :
Last meeting : 29. January 2011, Schalke 0-1 Hoffenheim
Wins Schalke : 1
Wins Hoffenheim : 3
Draws : 2

Recent Performance :
Schalke - W/L/W/W/W
Hoffenheim - L/D/L/W/W

Possible Line-Ups :
Schalke : Unnerstall - Höwedes, Papadopoulos, Matip, Fuchs, Jones, Holtby, Draxler, Raul, Farfan, Huntelaar.
Hoffenheim : Starke - Beck, Vorsah, Compper, Braafheid, Rudy, Salihovic, Obasi, Firmino, Babel, Ibisevic.

Betting Tip / Prediction :
Difficult match. Schalke favourite at home, but the young team seems not stable enough and Hoffenheim is a dangerous opponent. Not unlikely that Schalke won't be able to beat them again.
Our predict : Schalke Win