Hjulmand ahead of #OLYB04: ‘Our philosophy is our weapon’

"It's an emotional stadium, there’s going to be a great atmosphere," said Kasper Hjulmand at the start of the pre-match press conference on Monday night. The Dane has already been to the Stadio Georgios Karaiskakis with previous teams, so he knows the Olympiacos home ground inside out. For the game against the Greek top club, Hjulmand said, "we need a better performance than last time, to be honest. We need structure again. Our philosophy is our weapon and our way of playing football."

Hjulmand said of his opponents: "They play good football and have a good coach with a lot of experience (José Luis Mendilibar, ed.). They are compact and at the same time have individual quality. We know what kind of opponent we're up against. We are ready and our goal is to reach the next round of this competition. We have the opportunity to do that with a win. We're here to do that and are therefore looking forward to it."

Maza: "TAKE setbacks as Motivation"

Ibrahim Maza, for his part, talked about the recent defeats: "Of course, the games are on our minds a bit, but the mood is good. We'll take the setbacks as motivation and hopefully pick up three points."

When asked about the Africa Cup of Nations, Maza said: "It was a great tournament. It was a blow to get eliminated, but that's all part of it. You can only learn and develop from it. I feel great to be back here now."

A number of injured players, including Mark Flekken and Nathan Tella, will not be available for the game against Olympiacos. Hjulmand provided a squad update: "It's never nice, of course, but I always focus on the players available. We also have a good team with a lot of quality on the pitch tomorrow." The team will be cheered on in Athens by 1,400 travelling Bayer 04 fans.