Slumping Schalke have to face dangerous Hamburg

Bundesliga leaders Schalke 04 will have their hands full this evening trying to get back to their winning ways against a resurgent Hamburg SV in the key match of the weekend.

Schalke, looking for their first league title since 1958, have managed just a point from their last two matches, losing 1-0 to Bayer Leverkusen last week after a 2-2 draw at VfL Wolfsburg.

Schalke's woes were compounded further when their Brazilian playmaker Lincoln was handed a five-match suspension for a red card received for punching Leverkusen's Germany midfielder Bernd Schneider.

Hamburg have three successive victories under new coach Huub Stevens, including a 3-1 win against Eintracht Frankfurt a week ago, and have climbed out of the relegation zone. HSV are the only remaining founding Bundesliga club never relegated.

It will be a special homecoming match for Stevens, who won the 1997 UEFA Cup at Schalke and led the Gelsenkirchen club to second place in 2001 during his record-breaking 195-match career coaching Schalke.

That 2001 season still haunts Schalke. They squandered the title with a late slump and were eclipsed by Bayern Munich, who won it with an injury-time goal in the final match of the season.

Unwanted memories of that collapse are coming back now.

Schalke had a six-match winning streak and six-point lead over Werder Bremen two weeks ago. Schalke, with 49 points from 23 matches, still lead Werder, now third, by six points but are only four ahead of second-placed VfB Stuttgart.

Champions Bayern Munich, fourth with 40 points, play at Hertha Berlin tomorrow while Werder host VfL Bochum and Stuttgart travel to Bayer Leverkusen.

Although Schalke will be without Lincoln, they can count on Serbia defender Mladen Krstajic, who will be available thanks to a special shield to protect a broken rib suffered against Leverkusen.

Hamburg, led by in-form captain Rafael van der Vaart, have scored eight goals in their last three matches - with wins over B. Dortmund, Bremen and Frankfurt. Van der Vaart scored one and made a second in HSV's 3-1 win over Frankfurt.

HSV were only narrowly beaten by Schalke 2-1 in their first meeting this season.