2023-10-09 17:36:00
The Austrian national soccer team held its only public training session in Vienna on Monday evening. In pouring rain, team boss Ralf Rangnick started preparing for the potentially decisive European Championship qualifier on Friday (8.45 p.m./live ServusTV) in the Ernst Happel Stadium against Belgium with less than half of his current 27-man squad and a light unit. Around 200 onlookers and autograph hunters braved the conditions.
Rangnick was still not happy with the quality of the training ground in the Prater, which he had already publicly criticized the previous week, despite some cosmetic measures. He had ten field players and goalkeeper Niklas Hedl train on it for almost 45 minutes. Dortmund legionnaire Marcel Sabitzer, who is suffering from adductor problems, completed individual, light ball exercises. Freiburg striker Michael Gregoritsch, who was also injured, was not on the training pitch.
Because of the quality of the pitch, there was talk of moving the first full training session before the Belgium game on Tuesday afternoon (11:30 a.m.) to the main field of the Happel Stadium. The unit is already planned there on Wednesday and the final training on Thursday. In the dry stadium corridor, Rangnick and his protégés were available to the fans in attendance after the opening training session for autographs and selfies. The injured top stars David Alaba and Marko Arnautovic were, of course, missing.
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