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Germany: Eintracht to host high-flyers [Tue Sep 20th, 2005]
Eintracht are the latest side charged with the task of trying to stop Felix Magath's Bayern Munich when the league leaders roll into Frankfurt.
Bayern broke their own record for consecutive Bundesliga wins on Saturday with a 1-0 home victory over Hannover, and they can open up a five point gap at the top of the table if they extend that streak to 15 games when they travel to struggling Eintracht.
Frankfurt picked up a creditable draw in Hamburg at the weekend which will have boosted their confidence ahead of the biggest game of their season.
However they remain just above the bottom three with four points from the opening five fixtures and need a positive result to allay early fears of a season-long relegation battle.
Second-placed Bremen are also in action, hoping to maintain their excellent start to the season with strike duo Miroslav Klose (six goals) and Ivan Klasnic (five) in hot form.
The 2004 Bundesliga champions are just two points adrift of Bayern ahead of their trip to Monchengladbach, where they face a Borussia side still searching for form with many new signings yet to settle into Horst Koppel's team.
Hannover will be licking their wounds after becoming the latest side to succumb to Bayern at the weekend, but they will have to lift themselves with Wolfsburg arriving at the AWD-Arena.
Rounding up the action is a derby at the Westfalenstadion between Borussia Dortmund and Arminia Bielefeld, both in need of points to move away from the lower-regions of the Bundesliga.
Schalke and Hertha Berlin shared the points in a 0-0 draw on Sunday, a result which helped neither side in their pursuit of Bayern, but both teams will be confident of rediscovering their winning touch on Wednesday (Thursday morning) when they face Nurnberg and Duisburg respectively.
Rudi Voller's return to the bench with Bayer Leverkusen resulted in their first win in four games at the weekend and a return to the top half of the table.
The former Germany and Roma coach could be given the job on a full-time basis if he can prove his worth with a win over high-flying Cologne, although former Stuttgart coach Matthias Sammer is also being touted as a replacement for Klaus Augenthaler, who was sacked after a 1-0 defeat to CSKA Sofia in the UEFA Cup last Thursday.
Stuttgart boss Giovanni Trapattoni celebrated his first Bundesliga win in charge of the Swabians on Saturday and he will be hoping it is the start of an upward spiral for his side, who also won in Europe on Thursday and appear to have finally hit form.
Their next opponents will be third-placed Hamburg, a side looking to extend their unbeaten record this season to 15 games, including InterToto Cup, UEFA Cup and DFB-Pokal games, when they arrive at the Gottlieb-Daimler Stadium.
Finally, bottom-of-the-table Mainz make the short trip to Kaiserslautern still in search of their first points of the season.
PA Sport
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