An interview with Peniel Mlapa

Penni, after a tackle involving you and Maik Franz, the Frankfurt player hobbled away with a broken metatarsal. After the game he accused you of wanting to cause him deliberate harm.

It's ridiculous. Of course I didn't go into the tackle intending to hurt him. We were both going for the ball and unfortunately I got there a split second later than him and have caught him with my follow-through. We see things like that in football all the time and it had absolutely nothing to do with what happened in Frankfurt earlier this season. I feel bad about what happened and obviously wish him a speedy and successful recovery. I will be getting in contact again to offer my personal apologies.

Monday saw the announcement by 1899 Hoffenheim that Holger Stanislawski would be the new man in charge come the start of next season. What has the reaction been like amongst the squad?

Personally, I don't know him, but the squad hasn't taken much notice and they haven't let it affect them. What counts for us is the final four games of the season from which we want to take as many points as possible. That's what we're concentrating on and what happens after that, well we'll just have to wait and see.

You just touched on the fact that there are only four games left this season. What are your personal aims for the remaining fixtures?

Firstly, we all want the last four games to be a success so that we can feel good come the end of the season and finish on a positive note. What I'm hoping for personally is a little more game time. I want to make four appearances in the last four games maybe.

It starts on Saturday with the match against second placed Bayer 04 Leverkusen. What are you expecting from the match?

It isn't a coincidence that Bayer are in second place in the Bundesliga table. For us it's likely to be another difficult away game in which we are definitely the underdogs. They've almost got two players for every position on the field. However, it definitely doesn't mean that were going there to lose and despite our poor record inside the BayArena we're determined to cause an upset.