Red Bull Salzburg was the number one club in Austrian soccer for ten years in a row before Sturm won the championship twice in a row. This season, the Mozart city club wants to restore the old order.
Two years in the sporting shadow of Sturm Graz should be enough. The championship title is the declared goal of Red Bull Salzburg, which aims to be number one in the Austrian Bundesliga ten times in a row between 2014 and 2023. After an extraordinary preseason and with a little more experience in their typically young squad, coach Thomas Letsch’s team will begin their hunt for the defending champions from Graz this Saturday with an away game against newly promoted Ried.
Instead of a vacation after the season, Salzburg headed to the USA. Instead of traditional preseason training and friendly matches, the Red Bulls took part in high-quality matches under real competitive conditions at the Club World Cup. “We were all excited beforehand to see how it would be. A short vacation, then a few days of preparation, and then you fly over there. And the conclusion is that it works, to have a slightly different preparation and then go straight into competition,” said Letsch.
Club World Cup only positive
The trip to the US was not only a positive experience in financial terms. Salzburg kept up with the competition, was able to work intensively on team building and test newly formed line-ups against top opponents. “It was a great tournament. I don’t think you’ll find anyone in our club who has anything negative to say about the tournament. It’s quite a difference between playing for points in a packed stadium against a top international team and playing a test match somewhere and rotating the players. It’s important for us that we performed well there and now want to carry that momentum forward,” explained Letsch.
The heavily reshuffled back four, which included three new signings, had a chance to gel. “That was worth its weight in gold, of course,” said Letsch, who has gained a lot of experience in defensive stability. Salzburg brought 32-year-old right-back Stefan Lainer back to his hometown after six years in the German Bundesliga and strengthened its central defense with 28-year-old Dane Jacob Rasmussen.
More routine in defense
A lack of routine was perhaps one of the reasons why they came up short twice recently. “You always had a core of experienced players, and then they gradually left. I think it started two years ago, and maybe we underestimated it,“ said Letsch, recounting training matches between young and old players. ”At 20, if you were close to 21, you were in the old team. Maybe something went wrong in the past. And we haven’t necessarily corrected it, but we’ve adjusted it a little.”
Lainer is predestined for the role of experienced leader. He “brings an attitude and experience that may have been lacking.” They didn’t have to think twice “when you have the chance to get a player like that, who sets such a great example with his attitude and mentality.” Salzburg is also relying on experience in goal, with Letsch deciding early on that Alexander Schlager would be the number one. However, the talent pipeline is being filled at the same time. With Kerim Alajbegovic (17) and Sota Kitano (20), the club has once again brought in young players with great potential.
