José Gomes: We are in the period when everyone has the chance to break their way in to the team

"The latest special training awaits us this evening. This will be a friendly match with the first game of a tournament. This tournament will give us the chance to measure ourselves against very good sides, which will also be a big challenge for us, since we are still at the beginning of the pre-season period. We started to work around 10 days ago. I am sure that we have a big task ahead of us, with the squad usually training very hard twice a day, and this is why the players are tired. I am sure that they will all give their maximum as we are in the period when everyone has the chance to fight their way into the side. This is a healthy but very tough battle, and the players are clear with this. I can see it on them in the way they are training, as well as during our first friendly match, that they all want to prove themselves.

There is mixed news regarding injuries. Roland Juhasz has a small injury, and as expected is now back in contention for the game with Plovdiv. Zé Luis is also recovering nicely, but I will liaise with the medical staff during the day. It appears at the moment as though he will miss the evening game to be on the safe side. I would like to give Arturo Alvarez at least 20 minutes in the match, as he needs to pick up the tempo. Kleinheisler reported strong pain in his leg a day or two ago. It is similar to the slight injury that Juhasz had but is not that serious. I will rest him to avoid us having more serious problems. I am still planning to play two different sides in each half, but similarly to the match with Rijeka, some players will get more than 45 minutes out on the pitch. 

In the current phase of pre-season, the results are still not the most important, but rather that the team suitably prepares for the spring season. We need to improve in several things, but the most important is that if there are problems during the game, the players should think about the solution on the pitch. This is called team spirit, when the players all know what to do. We can only achieve this by practicing, practicing and practicing. This is what we have been doing since the first day of the training camp. Naturally as we are talking about a football match, winning is important. The players always want to win, even if we are talking about a friendly match or a match with high-stakes. They will also want to win if they are just kicking a ball around with their friends. This is also fine. However, I will repeat once more that the most important thing at a training camp is not the win. The most important is to lift the team spirit to a high level" - commented José Gomes to the clubs website.