Schalke vs Bayern Munich Prediction, Betting Tips & Preview

Preview

Haydn Cunningham Nov 16, 2015 @ 05:58 pm

Defeat in the Revierderby has compounded Schalke’s misery even further of late with a 5^th consecutive game without a victory to show. It was a creditable performance against Borussia Dortmund but a goal either side of the half time interval ultimately sealed their fate. The defeat has also dropped them two places in the league as Wolfsburg and Hertha Berlin both jumped over Schalke after the latest defeat. It has also increased the gap between the top two and the chasing clubs as 2^nd placed Dortmund now lead 3^rd placed Wolfsburg by a staggering 8 points after just 12 games. Klaas-Jan Hunterlaar doubled his total for the season with a brace against Dortmund but unfortunately it was not enough but the Dutch forward could have renewed confidence but face the formidable Bayern Munich who’ve dropped points just once in the league.

Bayern Munich will have been disappointed to lose their 100% record in the Bundesliga away at Eintracht Frankfurt at the end of October but have started November emphatically with two home victories, both by a very sizeable margin. A 5-1 demolition job of Arsenal has put them in control of their Champions League group and also got back to winning ways in the league with a comfortable 4-0 victory over Stuttgart before the international break. The last international break saw them lose Mario Gotze for a 2-3 month period and before that  Arjen Robben was also injured on international duty for a couple of months with Holland but his recent return to action has seen him net 5 times in 6 games for club and country. The dreaded curse has struck again as this time Thiago has been ruled out for the rest of November with a knee injury he sustained in the first half of Spain’s 2-0 victory over England.

In the past two meetings a 1-1 draw has been played out which will give Schalke some confidence on Saturday. That was the first time Schalke had scored against Bayern Munich at home in 5 attempts after previous meetings included 2-0, 2-0, 5-0 and 4-0 defeats. Robert Lewandowski is the top goal scorer across Europe’s 5 top leagues whilst Douglas Costa is the 2^nd top assistor in Europe. Bayern Munich are unsurprisingly top of the charts with regards to possession, averaging 69.9% of the ball in games. Xabi Alonso averages 88.5 passes per game and is an influential part of Munich’s midfield.

Thiago will be a big miss for the visitors and they’ll hope it is just a 2-3 week stint but he has suffered a number of injuries on his right knee and Munich will be hoping it’s a different type of injury to the ones he’s suffered previously. Johannes Geis is still serving part of his five match suspension and Benedikt Howedes is nursing a broken knuckle. There appears to be no returns any time soon for the defensive trio of Atsuto Uchida, Matija Nastasic and Felipe Santana.

Schalke

Stats: W-6 L-4 D-2

Recent Form - LLDDL

Bayern Munich

Stats: W-10 L-0 D-1

Recent Form - WWDWW

Head-to-head record:

Possible Line-ups

Schalke (4-4-2) – Fahrmann, Caicara, Matip, Neustadter, Aogo, Sane, Goretzka, Hojbjerg, Meyer, Hunterlaar

Bayern Munich (4-3-3) – Neuer, Lahm, Benatia, Boateng, Alaba, Alonso, Vidal, Muller, Doulgas Costa, Robben, Lewandowski

Injury List/Suspended Players

Schalke – Howedes (inj), Uchida (inj), Hoger (inj), Santana (inj), Nastastic (inj), Geis (sus)
Bayern Munich– Ribery (inj), Thiago (inj), Gotze (inj), Badstuber (inj), Rode (inj)

League Positions