Committed to PEOPLE'S RIGHT TO KNOW
Vol. 5 Num 837 Tue. October 03, 2006  
   
Sports


Loew to rest stars


Germany coach Joachim Loew hinted he could rest key players in Saturday's friendly against Georgia in Rostock as he looks ahead to their Euro 2008 qualifier in Slovakia on October 11.

"Players that have played a lot of football such as (Miroslav) Klose, (Torsten) Frings and (Philipp) Lahm will have individual programmes and time to recover," said Loew.

"These players will certainly not play the full 90 minutes against Georgia.

"The Georgia game is a chance to rest players and to test out one or two new faces. The important match is the one in Bratislava. We need to be 100 percent ready for that game and the Georgia match is to help us do that."

Alemannia Aachen striker Jan Schkaudraff, Werder Bremen defender Clemens Fritz and SV Hamburg midfielder Piotr Trochowski are the three new faces in the squad and will be hoping to make their debuts against Georgia.

Germany have started the qualifying campaign with a perfect two wins -- a 1-0 victory over the Republic of Ireland and a 13-0 annihilation of San Marino -- as Loew keeps faith with the players who helped the hosts finish third at the World Cup.

Striker Lukas Podolski has failed to get into the Bayern Munich team since a 10 million euro summer move from FC Cologne but the 21-year-old has a starting spot under Loew.

"He has scored five goals in the last two qualification matches and we are really happy with him," Loew said.