“I see no lack of self-confidence.”

We haven’t scored enough goals or created enough scoring opportunities in the last two games. But I see the games differently. Bielefeld was the only team that completely fell apart, and that’s remarkable, considering it’s only matchday 29.

In Hannover, we were in a lot of dangerous areas, but then we couldn’t finish the play cleanly. Of course, you can talk about Luca creating a lot of space, and Isac is a top striker whose absence we’ve been missing. But we don’t want to make excuses. I can also see in training with the guys who played that we’re on the upswing again.

We need to start picking up points again, but I’m not too worried about our overall performance and form. We shouldn’t let that fool us, though: Fürth’s record of conceding the most goals stems from the first half of the season when they had bigger problems. They’ve stabilised considerably now.

We need a mix of patience and a willingness to take risks in the final third. We have to be ready to press high up the pitch in crucial areas. If we make mistakes, we have to use them as an opportunity and win the ball back through counter-pressing.

We’re the team in the league that’s gone the longest without an away win. But internally, it doesn’t feel like we have an away-game problem. It’s not about external factors, because we’ve created extremely professional conditions over the last 20 months. We need to have the courage to believe in away games too, the same belief we always have at home: no matter how long it takes, we’ll eventually impose our game. That’s what sets us apart at home, and we need to emphasise that even more when we’re away.

For the past three to four weeks, we’ve been able to establish a training rhythm again. I can see that the team’s basic performance level shows we’re getting back to the form we had for much of the first half of the season. We were disappointed on Saturday evening. But we trained well on Sunday, then took two days off, and since Wednesday, we’ve been feeling that familiar buzz about the game in Fürth.

We’re considering the mental aspect as relevant before it actually becomes critical. We’ve been working with a sports psychologist since the start of the season. We’re constantly working on it, so it’s nothing out of the ordinary for us. In competitive sports, you always have to get into the right frame of mind. Just because we’ve lost two games doesn’t change the atmosphere in the locker room. Our advantage is that this season will always be considered a good one for us. But that doesn’t mean we don’t want to. We want to because we’re athletes, not because we have to. That’s a huge mental advantage. I don’t see any lack of self-confidence. We know what we’re capable of. We need to develop the confidence that we will impose our game, because we are entitled to that after the season so far.

I’m in contact with Paul and I’ve often told him how much I value him and that it was more a matter of timing that prevented him from stepping into the role he was given. Since he’s been in Fürth, I’ve also spoken to him on the phone and I’m following his excellent second half of the season very closely.

Killi’s problems started in the training camp, where we couldn’t yet get a clear diagnosis because it was a very complex situation. I’m still very grateful that our doctors invested so much time and effort. Then it was a relatively long road back to the pitch for him. When a player puts himself at the service of the team for months, doesn’t train regularly, but still makes appearances for the team, it’s rare for his form to improve. He deserves all my respect for putting the team first. He’s been able to participate in every training session again for the last two or three weeks, and it shows.

The same applies to Fabi Nürnberger. He’s been able to train fully again since the start of the international break in March. Against Hannover, I thought he was significantly stronger, and I sense in him what I sense in many players: they’re approaching their top form again. That’s why I’m optimistic that we can push both of them close to their limits and that they can then help us, as they already have, as key players.