Bundesliga in the ticker

Coach effect? GAK vs Rapid LIVE from 14:30

Neo-GAK coach Rene Poms

(Bild: GEPA/GEPA pictures)

Eleventh round of the Austrian Bundesliga: GAK take on Rapid. With sportkrone.at you will be there live from 14:30 - see ticker below. 

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New GAK coach Rene Poms has been denied a quiet settling-in period. In his first game in charge of the promoted team, Gernot Messner's successor will face Rapid in front of his own fans. Green-White travel to the bottom of the table in dazzling form, but will have to switch from the European stage to the "toils of the plain".

Poms took over from the hapless Gernot Messner on Tuesday, who no longer had much to laugh about after his acclaimed return to the Bundesliga with the Red Jackets. GAK are still waiting for their first Oberhaus win in 17 years, have just four points to their name and have recently conceded four defeats in a row. However, Poms doesn't see the team as being that far away. "I've seen teams that were in a much worse state. The team is intact," emphasized the long-time assistant coach to Nenad Bjelica, who was still coaching Greek second division side PAS Giannina the previous week.

He is convinced of his new squad and emphasized that he has "the highest ambitions with the GAK". The quality is undoubtedly there, "you know what the team is made of", said Poms. The lack of results was difficult for the players to digest in the long term. "That does something to a team." The "things that are taken for granted" need to be refreshed. The biggest lever in the short term is mental. There is a "new, positive mood, we needed that now," explained defender Lukas Graf.

This is not Poms' first encounter with Robert Klauß' Rapid. At the beginning of April, the Leoben team, then coached by the Styrian, lost 0:3 in the Cup semi-final, but that was not the reason why Poms announced his departure a day later. Rather, he left the sinking ship, which was denied a license by the league in May and is now sailing in the regional league. "Rapid is even better now. But I'm also with a better quality team now," said Poms. "The match starts from zero. We want to win this game."

"I can still remember him well," said Klauß, looking back on the cup duel. The German certainly felt sorry for Messner. Klauß described his dismissal as "always sad" and "so incomprehensible". "It's the curse of a good deed. If he hadn't been promoted, he would probably still be coach now."

Rapid coach Robert Klauß

(Bild: GEPA pictures)

"Great challenge"
For his team, the change only plays a subordinate role. "We've already experienced this in Altach, it doesn't change our approach much. We will look at what the coach did at his last stations and what GAK did recently," said Klauß. Switching from the European Cup to the league is much more difficult. "Switching between the competitions is a big challenge. GAK will sense their chance and try to make life difficult for us."

Naturally, there is not much to be said for the hosts. Rapid celebrated their fourth win in a row in the Conference League on Thursday with a 1-0 win over Armenia's runners-up FC Noah and are unbeaten in ten games. The last slip-up so far, a 3-0 defeat at Blau-Weiß Linz three days after the European Cup defeat in Braga, dates back to August 25. "We worked through that game well back then and discussed it again this week so that we always have it as a warning example," emphasized Klauß. "The boys are focused and want to show that they can also perform on Sunday and pick up the necessary points."