Markus Gisdol: “There's no award for what we've achieved so far”

Markus Gisdol on…

…the opponents

Paderborn invested cleverly during summer and have started the season incredibly. They have been a breath of fresh air. Paderborn are a team with a clear plan, plenty of self confidence, they play nice football and currently have 12 points. We will need to put in a top performance and have vocal backing from our supporters on Saturday if we want to win. It's going to be a tough game – no one coming to the game should think that victory is a foregone conclusion.

…the squad

Salihovic's knee hasn't fully recovered and Jin-Su Kim still has muscle problems, so they aren't available. They need a little more time but should be back soon.

...Oliver Baumann

He was fantastic in Hamburg and showed us that he is one of the best goalkeepers in Germany. He really is a top performer who really loves getting to grips with the sport and also talks about it a lot with his colleague away from the pitch. Since summer he has in every department hugely, which you can see through his positive body language.

…the current situation at TSG

We're delighted to be third but we're not quite at the level being so high up in the table suggests. A lot of our games have been tight and could easily have seen us come off the pitch defeated. We will continue to work hard and carry on going about our business quietly. We won't get any awards for what we've achieved so far. We've played well so far this season, but the league is strong. You could easily lose 3-0 to the side that are bottom.

Past meetings:

TSG and SC Paderborn have only met twice before, with both clashes coming in the 2007/08 second-division campaign – one that ended with Hoffenheim's promotion to the Bundesliga. TSG won both matches (2-0 and 1-0), with Sejad Salihovic scoring in both games. Whilst TSG celebrated promotion at the end of the season, SCP were relegated to the third tier.

The form of the opposition:

DWDWLLDW – it looks a bit strange but that's SC Paderborn's season in a nutshell. They have won three, drawn three and lost only twice. It has been a stunning start for the team who have continued last season's good form. The defeats? Away to Bayern and against Mönchengladbach, who are the current top two in the Bundesliga. Andre Breitenreiter's side beat Frankfurt 3-1 after being 1-0 down for a large portion of the game last week and would have beaten Leverkusen had it not been for a late equaliser. One thing is certain; it's never boring when Paderborn take to the field.

The key battles:

TSG have 14 points and lie in third, SCP have two points less and are seventh. There are a lot of similarities between the sides statistically, but Hoffenheim do hold an advantage over the visitors in a physical sense. Markus Gisdol's side win an average of 250 tackles per game; Paderborn win 30 fewer. If TSG want to win the match, they will need to make the most of their superior physicality.

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