It has been a special week for Maximilian Philipp. The striker made his debut start for SV Werder against SC Freiburg, in which he was able to celebrate scoring a goal but not a win as Werder were defeated 2-1 in the end. Immediately after the game, the 29-year-old, along with his teammates, turned his focus to the upcoming task: the away match against Hertha BSC, which also meant a return to his former club.
The striker received a lot of appreciation from his teammates for his dogged performance, which was almost rounded off with a second goal from a scissor kick. Even though the game was different without Füllkrug, who was injured, Philipp did a great job according to Romano Schmid. “We linked up a bit more than usual. You could see the quality that Mili has. He replaced Fülle very well, even though he is a completely different type of player,” said the midfielder in praise of his teammate, which was echoed by captain Marco Friedl, “Mili played well and gave us the security that we also get from Füllkrug.”
The Green-Whites now have to look ahead to their upcoming opponent. Hertha are still at the bottom of the table after the last matchday, but they are still in direct competition with SVW. The Werder team does not want to call the match a decisive game for their aim of staying in the league, however. “The game has the same importance as all the others. You can see that three points are possible for us in every single game, and that includes in Berlin,” explained head coach Ole Werner, and Friedl added: “There are still a lot of important games after that, including against teams near us, but I’m not thinking about Schalke or Bayern or Leipzig right now,” said the Austrian. “Our goal is clear, we are playing direct rivals. It will be a well-fought game and there will be a huge number of fans in Berlin. It’s something to look forward to.”
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MILLLIIIIIIIIII!!! ⚽
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Philipp is also looking forward to the upcoming clash, not only on account of the “special stadium” and the many Werder fans. In Berlin, SVW want to pick up the “big points” and take a major step towards securing their place in the league. “That’s how we will approach the game. If we can give the same performance as against Freiburg and use our goalscoring chances well, we will travel back home with a good result,” said Werder’s number 17 optimistically. It would have almost been a different kind of encounter this coming Saturday. When the Berlin native was looking for a loan in winter, his youth club Hertha BSC were also interested in him. However, a “gut feeling” and “the football the boys play here in Bremen” made him favour a move to Werder. “Of course Hertha is a special club for me. I learnt a lot there and I’m extremely grateful to the club,” Philipp said looking back, adding, “but I’m a Werder Bremen player so I’m not looking at Hertha. Sure, there’s a bit of affection there, but I’m fully focused on SVW.”
