This Saturday (3.30pm) Cologne, a Bundesliga history and now penultimate, will fight to avoid relegation, for which it is forced to defeat bottom-side Schalke, who has already gone down. This Friday the last Cologne training session before this momentous last day of the German championship took place under strong police protection.
The atmosphere around Cologne is so tense that this Friday their preparatory session, before the crucial match against Gelsenkirchen, took place under a large security device, including 13 police cars and various officers dressed in plain clothes, according to the Bild newspaper. The club feared that the fans would get into training.
Cologne, coached by Friedhelm Funkel, not only need to beat the already relegated Schalke, but also Werder Bremen does not win at home against Borussia Mönchengladbach and Arminia Bielefeld does not do it at home to Stuttgart.