Schwaben come to Düsseldorf

With the home match in Düsseldorf, a large crowd will cheer on Werkself against visiting VfB Stuttgart. After the 1-1 draw in Dortmund, Bruno Labbadia is anxious for the first win of the Rückrunde as they have fell five points behind 1899 Hoffenheim, saying:

"This is the stage where we have to win games. Especially against teams like Stuttgart who can emerge from the bottom half of the table. We need to get all three points to secure our position and keep us clear of a direct rival.

"A positive with Lukas Sinkiewicz was that he reacted well after his mistake against Dortmund. Mistakes will always happen although it’s obviously bad if a mistake leads to a goal. But he got back into the game and applied himself. We haven’t decided yet and we’ll see how the players do in training."

Bayer 04 is completely healthy for the match, although new star Toni Kroos will need to wait to debut as he is still recovering from an ankle injury. While Henrique has recovered from injury, the proposed lineup in the defending back-line has Gonzalo Castro, Lukas Sinkiewicz, Manuel Friedrich and Michal Kadlec. Without any reason for change our German honoured pair Patrick Helmes and Stefan Kießling will be up-front with Renato Augusto, Arturo Vidal and Tranquillo Barnetta going forward