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"April will be very important," declared Alonso at the pre-match press conference on Thursday afternoon. "We are six points behind FC Bayern and there are still 24 points to play for. It won't be easy but the desire is definitely there. The clear target is to fight to the end. We want to apply as much pressure as possible. And tomorrow we have the first opportunity to close the gap. So we have to win."
The mood in the team is very good following the brilliant 4-3 victory at VfB Stuttgart on the last matchday: "We are in great shape. The comeback in Stuttgart was a big win. That helped us feel good again after a difficult week."
Alonso did sound a warning about the team led by head coach Dieter Hecking who is unbeaten in his last three Bundesliga games against the Werkself: "They are fighting with all their might to stay up and recently showed their strength not only against FC Bayern (3-2, ed.) but also against other big teams like Dortmund (2-0, ed.) and Leipzig (3-3, ed.)." The Spaniard added: "Our negative experience with the defeat against Bremen (0-2, ed.) is still fresh. We made a lot of mistakes in that game. We've learned our lesson from that."
The 43-year-old can call on all twelve players on duty in the international break: "They have all come back fit and well." Robert Andrich, Jonathan Tah, Alejandro Grimaldo, Aleix Garcia, Jeremie Frimpong and Lukas Hradecky returned to training with the team in Leverkusen on Wednesday.
Nathan Tella is not available for tomorrow’s game. For Martin Terrier, a return is realistic for the away fixture at FC Heidenheim (5 April). And Alonso also talked about Florian Wirtz with cautious optimism: "He feels better and perhaps he will be back sooner than expected."
The BayArena is sold out for the game on Friday night with 3,000 away fans travelling from Bochum. The motto for the matchday league wide is: ‘TOGETHER! STOP HATE. BE A TEAM.’
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