Three days after VfL Bochum’s defeat in the Bundesliga opener against Mainz 05 (1:2), Thomas Reis talks about the personnel situation and the defence.

The left side of defence has been one of VfL Bochum’s problem areas lately. Regular starter Danilo Soares will be missing for weeks, and newcomer Jannes Horn promptly injured himself on his debut in the DFB Cup (torn muscle fibre). At least Konstantinos Stafylidis was fit in time for the Bundesliga opener against Mainz 05 (1:2). However, the Greek was absent at the start of the week due to muscular problems that had already forced him to take a break recently.

The tendency, whether it is enough for a deployment against Stafylidis’ ex-club TSG Hoffenheim on Saturday? “It’s hard to say,” coach Thomas Reis said on the sidelines of Tuesday’s training session. “But if he can’t play, we will find someone else.” At least it won’t be Horn, who came from Cologne. Reis expects him to return next week.

Back in team training, but not yet an option for the Hoffenheim game, is Jacek Goralski. The new signing for the defensive midfield recently took a break to recover from an eye operation. “He’s not quite as far behind in terms of fitness. So far he seems to be coping well with the strain, but he probably needs another week or two in team training,” said Reis, who wants to build up the Polish international carefully.

In the midfield centre, the Revierklub has sufficient personnel even without Goralski. The situation is different in the defensive chain. In addition to the shortage on the left, the opening defeat against Mainz once again showed that there is a need for action in central defence. Mainz striker Karim Onisiwo was able to nod in his two headers almost undisturbed by Ivan Ordets and Erhan Masovic. And these were not the only situations in which the defence was shaky.

“We clearly addressed what the problem was. We were actually always in equal numbers, but unfortunately we didn’t always play man-to-man in the box, which was very annoying,” said Reis, who was already pissed off about the defensive behaviour immediately after the game. On Tuesday, he renewed his criticism: “You could see that we still have big problems at the moment. Today’s training session also showed that. That definitely has to improve,” the Bochum coach demanded.