7. Kaiserslautern (1) vs Augsburg (3)

‘Lautern celebrate the title with home win

TEAM NEWS

The Kaiserslautern team will certainly be at full strength for this final game of the season as the fans celebrate promotion with them, hopefully with a win also to seal the league title.

Regular goalkeeper Sippel returns after a break last weekend while, more importantly, Sam is back to lead the attack.

Bugera is also back for Pavlovic, making this a first-choice selection.

Augsburg coach Jos Luhukay is expected to rest several key players for this game with Thurk possibly only on the bench to start with. Tobias Werner could therefore make his first-team debut in attack.

With one eye on the play-off, it would be a surprise if Luhukay played with his best team.

Imre Szabics and Goran Szukalo are both back in training and could play in this game to build up strength in case they are required for the play-off.

Kaiserslautern

Suspended: None

Doubtful: None

Injured/unavailable: Pierre de Wit (Knee ligaments)

Augsburg

Suspended: None

Doubtful: None

Injured/unavailable: None

MATCH PREVIEW

Since Kaiserslautern’s promotion was sealed, they have stopped performing as well as they have for much of the season and have lost and drawn their last two games.

Nevertheless, they should find the motivation to win this game since if they lose it, they may not finish top but rather second.

The stadium is completely sold-out and the fans want to see the title celebrations, not just promotion celebrations.

Augsburg can no longer catch second-placed St Pauli for automatic promotion so it is now certain that they will be playing a play-off match if they want to go up to the Bundesliga next season.

Nevertheless, their recent form is good with two wins and a draw.

Augsburg don’t really have much motivation to spoil Kaiserslautern’s party while it is also imaginable that they take it easy to preserve energy for the play-offs. That makes a home win very likely indeed.

HEAD TO HEAD

Augsburg stunned Kaiserslautern with a 4-1 win in December to end their unbeaten run in away matches to the end of the year. That was Augsburg’s third win in four home games, but they have never won at the Betzenberg, losing two and drawing one.