Football Season Guide

St. Polten

In


Alex Schmidt (manager), Ahmet Muhamedbegovic (def) (Amstetten - back from loan), Roope Riski (mid) (Chania Kissamikos - back from loan)

Out


Ranko Popovic (manager), Taxiarchis Fountas (r) (mid) (Rapid), Roko Mislov (r) (mid) (released), Patrick Puchegger (sp) (def) (Amstette - loan)

St.Polten started the 2018/19 season with so much promise, but everything went downhill for them after losing manager Didi Kuhbauer to Rapid. The Wolf Pack accumulated enough points in the early stages of the campaign to still finish inside the top half and qualify for the Championship Group, but were abysmal in the second half of the campaign and failed to qualify for Europe. Ranko Popovic managed to receive a vote of confidence midway through the spring season, but was not allowed to stay up past the summer, with Alex Schmidt coming in to replace him. The Wolf Pack have also lost their arguably standout performer Taxiarchis Fountas, who will once again team up with Kuhbauer at Rapid, while no new signings have been made so far. This will be their fourth consecutive season in the top flight and the previous campaign was by far the best one that they had, with the previous two seeing them finish next-to-bottom and bottom, with the latter finish not resulting in relegation due to administrative reasons. Therefore, the form that St.Polten displayed in the second half of the previous campaign was pretty much in line with their usual level and they have done nothing during the summer that would suggest that this could change.

Target


With the exception of the first third of the previous season, St.Polten played in relegation form in all of the previous three years and likely face another battle against the drop.