This week, there will be no regular pre-match press conference ahead of Saturday's game in Freiburg with the first-team squad staying on the road. The night after Union's 1-3 DFB Pokal quarter-final loss to Bayer Leverkusen, head coach Urs Fischer spoke with our media team about the things to take away from Wednesday and what to expect at the weekend.

How are things with you? How are things with the team?

I don't know as we haven't seen them yet. What can I say?  Very proud, a great performance from the team who basically did everything right for 70 minutes, then a second yellow card and the game turns. And then, sure, the disappointment is part of it, when you are knocked out of the Cup I believe we came really we close. In the end, unfortunately, we haven't done it. Despite that, we go again, it's time to pick ourselves up again. The next task awaits us on Saturday in Freiburg. A very difficult one.

What did we learn from the game yesterday?

I think we can take a lot of things away with us. Above all, what we showed in the first 70 minutes. From a tactical point of view, it was really good. From a work-rate, stubbornness point, as we spoke before Leverkusen, we put them under pressure. The team implemented that brilliantly. Then you get a second yellow and sure, in the last 20 minutes, there's some things you can do better in the future. Learning is part of it, and after the red, there were things we didn't do well. Then after it, too many mistakes. We knew before the game that they'll take advantage of our mistakes. After the red, we've simply made too many of them. We take it with us. Also being a little more clever in a chaotic period with one player fewer. That's what we take with us.

We go to Freiburg now. Two games, two times won. What should we expect there at the weekend?

I presume they'll want to do well. They won't want it to be a third time. They'll be ready, for sure. It's important for us to use the two days to recover, get rid of the defeat from our mind as quickly as possible. Then we need to focus on Freiburg. It'll be an interesting challenge, a doable one. I expect a very hard game.