Huntelaar: Only win at Freiburg will be enough
Only victory at Freiburg on the last match day of the season will suffice if Schalke 04 are to rescue a patchy season, striker Klaas-Jan Huntelaar said on Monday.
A win would guarantee the club a fourth place finish in the Bundesliga and a Champions' League qualifying round spot. Even a draw could be enough to secure premier European action next season if sixth-placed Eintracht Frankfurt fail to beat VfL Wolfsburg.
But for a club, which famously lost out on a Bundesliga title on the last instance in 2001, making sure of all three points against Freiburg, who are on 51 in fifth place, is a priority.
"The safest thing to do is to go there and win," Dutchman Huntelaar said on the club website.
"We will be spending some time this week to watch videos of the match to see what went wrong," he said in reference to their 2-1 defeat to visiting VfB Stuttgart on Saturday.
Schalke made the Champions' League knockout stages this season but dropped down the table after a good start before the arrival of coach Jens Keller in December.
"We cannot change what happened [on Saturday]," said Huntelaar, who returned with a hat-trick late last month following a seven-week injury break.
"That is why everything focuses on Freiburg. We are still fourth and are in control. We have to present ourselves again as a team, play more offensively and convert our chances."
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