“A step in the right direction”

Christian Heidel: "I doubt there are people out there that would accuse our lads of not giving everything today. It was a real battle against a good side. It was what we needed at home in front of our fans. We started to think about things at the end, and that led to us sitting back and defending, though we had our fans behind us. We deserved this victory ultimately. This was a step in the right direction and we’ll see what kind of a turning point this was in the coming weeks. It’s incredibly important for our confidence as a team. I also want to add that we once again had a number of injured players and were without seven lads today. Nobody would have thought Brajan could have played today after what happened yesterday afternoon. He went to hospital, got stitched up and then said he wants to play. He initially wore a mask and then threw it away after a few minutes – that’s the kind of thing you want to see in a relegation battle. It was a close call, but he simply gave everything he could for the team. Bo is such a positive guy with lots of energy and he transferred that to the team. He said that we would beat Augsburg and the players believed that right away. Saying that everything was bad before today would be wrong. The coach has brought some passion to the club. Today feels good, but we still need to pick up a lot of points. We won’t head to Leverkusen on Friday simply aiming to lose by a narrow margin.”

Sepp van Berg: “The head coach is just as passionate as he came across in the press conference. He speaks to us in that exact manner, and brings a lot of energy into the team. The first half was really good, and we could have wrapped the game up then and there. After the break, we started to get a bit tired, but our strength of character got us through. Winning at home this afternoon was incredibly important. This is only the beginning. We do need to continue to work hard, but we’re happy to have been able to give something back to the fans today. I’ve lost out on a lot of sleep this season, but tonight will hopefully be a different story. This is a step in the right direction. We practiced set pieces a lot in training, so if they work out for us in the remaining games, that would be great. I’m pleased to have scored my second goal of the season - it was a long time coming.”

Phillipp Mwene: “The head coach filled us with confidence by telling us what a great team we are and reminding us of our ability. He did that repeatedly throughout the week, and we believed him. Without wanting to go into too much detail, he also spoke very passionately in the changing room before the game. It was essentially about having self-belief and being proud of ourselves. I think that today’s game was like many others we've seen this season. We started strong and narrowly missed the opportunity to double our lead, but this time we held it together until the final whistle. The bottom line is that we deserved to come out on top. We need to turn things up a level now. We’re ready to face Leverkusen on Friday.”