Vienna: Austria team manager Andreas Herzog called on his players to ignore the baiting of Germany in a tabloid and stay focused if they want to beat the three-time champions on Monday at the European Championship.
An Austrian tabloid printed inflammatory, vulgar headlines and quotes directed toward the Germans on Saturday, infuriating the Austrian team who need to win and hope Croatia beat Poland to advance as Group B runner-up and play Portugal in the quarter-finals.
"It's so important to stay cool now," Herzog said on Sunday. "We must not think that the Germans fear us - they don't. They will come out completely different compared to their Croatia match. They'll want to show from kickoff who's the boss on the field. It's their class that they can play that way."
"Not what you say before or after a match, but what counts is your performance on the field."
"We scare the ... out of Germany," Austria forward Martin Harnik was quoted as saying by the daily Oesterreich newspaper.
"They can stick the FIFA rankings ... " Herzog said, according to the same newspaper.
Returning to matters on the field, Herzog praised Germany for traditionally playing at their best when it matters most.
"They always do well in decisive tournament matches," he said. "They may be big-mouthed at times, but then they deliver the goods on the field.
"We won't change dramatically just because we are playing Germany. We must play compact. Every player has to go beyond himself, perform more than a 100 per cent."
Austria coach Josef Hickersberger, who called the game "the biggest match of my life," expected Germany to start aggressively in an attempt to take an early lead.
"Germany must redeem itself after losing to Croatia, that's their mentality," Hickersberger said. "They will look for an early decision. We have taken our measures to hold against it.
"We must be more effective, take better advantage of the opponent's mistakes. If we do that, I rate our chance of winning at 40 per cent."
Like Hickersberger indicated earlier this week, Herzog said he was proud of the progress the young Austrian squad had made.
"Over the last two years, many were laughing at us because we only were at the European Championship because we were hosting it," Herzog said. "It's great that we are still in with a chance of advancing. We've proven impressively that we can play some good football."
Captain Andreas Ivanschitz agreed with Herzog and praised his team's performances in its first two matches.
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"This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to beat Germany and to reach the quarter-finals," the midfielder said. "We deserve to be at the European Championship."
The squad left its team base at Stegersbach earlier on Sunday and completed a final training session at Ernst Happel Stadium in Vienna.
Hickersberger will decide on his lineup after the session, but Herzog revealed there won't be many chances from Thursday's 1-1 draw with Poland at the same venue.
Defender Sebastian Proedl, who scored twice against the Netherlands in a warm-up match in March, is suspended and likely to be replaced by Martin Hiden for his 50th international.
Austria midfielder Rene Aufhauser is likely to mark Germany playmaker Michael Ballack.
"Ballack is important for their game as he is the central player," said Aufhauser, Austria's most experienced player with 53 internationals.
"He initiates many attacks, but we won't adapt our game because of him and will rely on our own strengths."
In a friendly between the two neighbours before Euro 2008, Austria dominated possession for 60 minutes but couldn't score and Germany won 3-0.
Miracle of Cordoba vs Shame of Cordoba
While Austria are looking to the past for inspiration ahead of its last-chance European Championship match against Germany, their opponents are trying the opposite approach.
Germany were beaten by Austria 3-2 at the 1978 World Cup in Argentina, a result that sent the defending champions spiraling out of the tournament. It remains one of the most famous Austrian sports victories over its bigger neighbour, and is known in Germany as the "Shame of Cordoba."
The Austrians could again ruin a tournament for Germany when they meet on Monday in Vienna in their final Euro 2008 Group B match, but Germany coach Joachim Loew isn't even thinking about the past.
"Cordoba is really not an issue we talk about a lot," Loew said on Sunday. "Many of the players were not even born back then. The media tries to play up the issue, but you can't compare the two matches."
Try telling that to the Austrians.
With little international success to look back upon and a particularly barren few years recently have naturally led to the country's media and players, including captain Andreas Ivanschitz, reaching back 30 years ago for inspiration.
An injury-time penalty on Thursday earned Austria a 1-1 draw with Poland that kept alive their hopes of reaching the next round, and led to fevered speculation that there could be a repeat of what is known in the Alpine republic as the "Miracle of Cordoba."
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Despite losing to Croatia 2-1 last time, Germany need only to avoid defeat to advance behind Portugal and Loew is confident of progress.
"They want their shot at the quarter-finals," Loew said.
"They are under as much pressure as we are but it is impossible to compare the two matches. We will impose our game upon our opponent."
Poland must win big against Croatia
Poland needs a big victory against Croatia and a lot of help in Monday's other Group B match to keep alive its hopes of advancing to the quarterfinals at the European Championship.
Poland must win in Klagenfurt over Croatia, which has already secured top spot in the group, by three or four goals, and needs Austria to beat Germany in Vienna on Monday in order to advance.
"We know exactly our situation, and we have a lot of confidence that we can have a positive result versus Croatia," Poland coach Leo Beenhakker said. "At the same time, we have the small hope that it will be enough to stay in the tournament via the back door."
Croatia, on the other hand, stormed through the front door into the quarterfinals.
Coach Slaven Bilic's team has already wrapped up a spot in the knockout stage with wins over Austria and Germany. That now allows the manager to reshuffle his lineup to rest most of his top stars for Croatia's quarterfinal match against either the Czech Republic or Turkey.
Five Croatia players, including star midfielder Luka Modric, have yellow cards and are unlikely to play Monday to prevent the possibility of getting a second yellow and missing the quarterfinals.
"We are not crazy to risk the second yellows," Bilic said. "The other criteria for not playing are injuries and fatigue from previous matches."
Midfielder Darijo Srna, defenders Josip Simunic and Robert Kovac, and strikers Ivica Olic and Mladen Petric are all likely to join Modric on the bench.
Bilic said Dario Simic, who did not take the field for Croatia in its opening two matches, will captain the squad Monday in what will be his 99th international appearance.
"I hope I will play a good game against Poland, and strengthen my chances of playing in the quarterfinals," the 32-year-old Simic said Sunday.
Up front, Ivan Klasnic is expected to lead the Croatia attack, becoming the the first player ever to take part at the European Championship after a kidney transplant.
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While fielding primarily a second squad, Bilic said he was confident the players on the field would perform.
"I have no fear that they will embarrass us. I believe in this team, like I believe all 23 players in the squad," Bilic said.
Poland needs to believe, too, that it can win big against Croatia to keep its slim hopes of advancing alive.
But the Poles have not shown at the tournament that they possess the firepower to score heaps of goals, let alone to do so against a talented Croatian side that outclassed pre-tournament favorite Germany.
Poland's sole goal in its first two matches came against Austria - widely considered the weakest team in the tournament - and the Poles have struggled to create quality scoring opportunities, let alone finish the few it has created.
Asked whether his team is capable of beating Croatia by the necessary margin, Beenhakker said without hesitation: "I don't know."
The coach has said that the need to score may force him to juggle his starting lineup, without specifying what those changes might be.
And it's not clear what options he has.
The squad is still smarting from the loss of attacking midfielder Jakub Blaszczykowski and forward Maciej Zurawski, both of whom are sidelined with injuries.
The players who are available haven't played up to potential.
Ebi Smolarek, who led Poland with nine goals in qualifying and came into the tournament with huge expectations, has been largely invisible up front.
An air of resignation has hung over the camp since the injury-time penalty awarded to Austria left the Poles with one point instead of three from their second match, and took their fate out of their own hands.
Still, they say they are determined to fight as long as there is a slim hope of playing on.
"We have to show that we can win. We lost one match, we drew another, now the time has come to win one," defender Jacek Bak said. "The hope exists that we aren't playing our last game, but our second to last or maybe we'll play more, but it's clearly a very difficult situation."
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