Once again the Werder players are on their travels for another away game. On Monday the destination wasn’t the champions in Munich but rather the more obscure Erzgebirge region. In the district town of Aue, the Green-Whites will take on third division opposition in the second round of the DFB Cup on Tuesday evening.

Unfortunately for trainer Thomas Schaaf, once again he will have to make do without the services of a number of very important individuals. Aside from Daniel Jensen (Achilles tendon) and Torsten Frings (muscular problems), who are still suffering with problems from the previous week, now Per Mertesacker and Martin Harnik have had to remain in Bremen through illness.

On a more positive note, German international Clemens Fritz and Portuguese striker Hugo Almeida have both returned to join their team mates. Mesut Özil will also make the trip to Erzgebirge, glowing with confidence after another extremely impressive performance at the weekend. And there was plenty of praise about for the young midfielder on Monday: “We are very satisfied with the manner in which he has approached the task here with us. On Saturday he rewarded himself for a great game with a fantastic goal. He is going about things much more offensively both on and off the pitch,” acknowledged Thomas Schaaf.

The coach expects more and more from the attacking 19 year old: “We’ve known for some time just how much talent he possesses, but now he is displaying that better all the time. He has the ability to become a very important player here with us. He is certainly headed in the right direction, but he also knows that there is more to come. He will have to continue proving himself and develop further as a player.”

The squad for the DFB Cup clash with Erzgebirge Aue is:

Tim Wiese, Christian Vander; Sebastian Boenisch, Petri Pasanen, Naldo, Dusko Tosic, Frank Baumann, Jurica Vranjes, Clemens Fritz, Markus Rosenberg, Diego, Mesut Özil, Aaaron Hunt, Sebastian Prödl, Boubacar Sanogo, Hugo Almeida, Claudio Pizarro, Peter Niemeyer