Fleetwood Town’s pre-season schedule continues later on today as the side meet up with Marc-Patrick Meister’s Karlsruher SC for the first game of the 2017 Austria tour at SV Kopfgarten.
Town kicked off their pre-season just two days before leaving for Austria as they came out victors against Scottish Championship side Queen of the South thanks to a Paolo di Canio-esque volley from Lewie Coyle.
The 3.Liga side we will be facing have already had an extensive pre-season so far as we will be the second-last on their list. KSC started in mid-June when they walked over 1. FC Mühlhausen 15-0 before beating FV Concordia Hambrücken 8-0 three days later.
Karlsruher conceded their first goal in the third pre-season game against FK Pirmasens, even though they still won 5-2, but it started a rough streak of results as they are yet to win a game in July, losing against both FC Ingolstadt 04 and MSV Duisburg.
TEAM NEWS
Town will be looking to field a strong side as they are wanting to keep their 100% record so far, as none of the 26 players who embarked on the trip have picked up injuries.
KSC have been hit with problems in regard to their squad throughout June and July as striker Oskar Zawada missed the last game through illness.
Trio Fabian Schleusener, Marcel Mehlem and Alexander Siebeck are being brought back into games gradually as they have all spent time out over the summer.
ONE TO WATCH
Domonik Stroh-Engel, who was born in Ehrinshausen in West Germany, has started his time at Karlsruher with unbelievable form as he has either scored or assisted six goals during the sides pre-season so far.
The player nicknamed ‘Dodo’ started his career at SC Waldgrimes in 2003, and because he boasted a good goal to game ratio, he earned a move to Eintracht Frankurt ahead of the 2005-06 season.
His time at Frankfurt was successful as he managed to score over half of his sides total goals in the 2005-06 Oberliga season. He then made three appearances for the main team before moving to SV Wehen Wiesbahan in 2007.
Even though the striker managed to score 30 goals in 59 games, and even get eight goals for the main side in three years, his contract was cancelled at the end of the 2009-10 season, leading to a move to SV Babelsberg 03.
Two years later, he would return to SV Wehen but only for a year as he ended up moving to SV Darmstadt 98 in 2013. Stroh-Engel set a new 3.Liga record in 2014 as he managed to score 27 goals in a single season, beating the previous record by five.
The striker played an integral role in the surprise promotion into 2.liga that season. He also managed to score nine goals after.