Henriksen: "We have to be a horrible team to play against"

Mainz head to Munich on Saturday to take on the league leaders as they look to claim important points in the race for European football

Matchday 31 of the 2024/25 Bundesliga season sees 1. FSV Mainz 05 play away at league leaders FC Bayern on Saturday at 15:30 CEST. Bo Henriksen’s side are looking to get back to winning ways after failing to taste victory in each of their last five games. The 05ers showed they can beat the record champions earlier this season, winning 2-1 thanks to a Jae-sung Lee brace to hand FCB their first league defeat of the current campaign.

Nevertheless, Bayern, unbeaten in their last five games, will be the favourites for Saturday’s match-up. The league leaders sit on 72 points and could potentially seal the title this weekend. Meanwhile, Mainz currently occupy sixth place with 47 points. FSV’s most recent game was a 2-2 draw at home against VfL Wolfsburg, while the Bavarians won 4-0 in Heidenheim. Every point matters for Mainz in the battle for Europe, so Henriksen’s team are hoping they can get something from the Allianz Arena on Saturday.

HEAD COACH BO HENRIKSEN SPOKE AT THE PRE-MATCH PRESS CONFERENCE ABOUT...

...the squad for Saturday: "Stefan Bell is available again. He’s not yet back to 100% but can hopefully play on Saturday. We will be without Maxim Leitsch and we’ll have to see if Moritz Jenz can feature. Everyone else is fit and ready for the game against Bayern.”

...the Mainz defence: "There are several reasons why we haven’t been at our best at the back recently. We have been unlucky at times too and were without Dominik Kohr for two games after his red card against Freiburg. We have had to rotate our defence a lot in general this season, however that hasn’t stopped us from doing well at the back. The most important thing is that our defensive statistics are still really good – we work hard in training every day to ensure they are.”

...the draw against Wolfsburg: "We were obviously disappointed after the game. We should have won based on the run of play. It’s now even more important that we take every chance we get to win a game. Looking back at our performance against Wolfsburg and the number of chances we created, we should have won the game according to the statistics.”

…on the mood within the team: “Despite our recent results, we’ve still got confidence and the mood within the team is good. Watching us train yesterday, it’s hard to believe that this team hasn’t won any of their last five games. We’re working very, very well in training and had quite possibly our best training session of the season on Wednesday. Tomorrow, we’ll head to Munich and we’re looking forward to achieving something with the four games we have left. It’s a fantastic feeling to be in a European spot and despite facing a stiff challenge in Munich, we want to continue competing with the top teams - to do that, we have to be a horrible team to play against.”

…on the 7,000 fans expected to make the trip to Munich: “It’s extremely important for us to have our fans there with us at every game. It’s crazy how passionately they support us – that’s what makes football such an emotional game. I know that it’s not easy to win in Munich, but we have a chance. The level of support from our fans has been incredible in both our last two games and I hope that we will be able to give something back to the fans on Saturday.”

First team Bungert: “We want to be as close to perfection as possible” Alle News