AUSTRIA CALL ON 43 PLAYERS
AUSTRIA have named an enormous 43-man squad for their World Cup tie against Scotland – but will still be without a combined total of 675 caps for their trip to Glasgow.
Franco Foda has named a bloated preliminary crew which will be trimmed on Friday because they include 19 players based in Germany who almost certainly won’t be allowed to travel.
He has included seven uncapped players with former Kilmarnock loanee Daniel Bachmann and Rapid Vienna’s Ercan Kara and Yusuf Demir, who have chosen to represent Austria rather than Turkey.
He’s also handed a recall to Sturm Graz winger, Jakob Jantscher, who hasn’t played for Austria for five years and PAOK midfielder Stefan Schwab, who hasn’t featured for four.
The Austrians are without their top scorer Marko Arnautovic, who has not been released by Shanghai Port, and captain Julian Baumgartlinger, who is injured.
The 19 German-based players missing from the named squad are: Pavao Pervan (Wolfsburg), David Alaba (Bayern Munich), Aleksandar Dragovic (Bayer Leverkusen), Marco Friedl (Werder Bremen), Martin Hinteregger (Eintracht Frankfurt), Stefan Lainer (Borussia M’gladbach), Philipp Lienhart (Freiburg), Stefan Posch (Hoffenheim).
Christopher Trimmel (Union Berlin), Florian Grillitsch (Hoffenheim), Stefan Ilsanker (Eintracht Frankfurt), Valentino Lazaro (Monchengladbach), Karim Onisiwo (Mainz), Christoph Baumgartner (Hoffenheim), Marcel Sabitzer (RB Leipzig), Xaver Schlager (Wolfsburg), Alessandro Schopf (Schalke), Michael Gregoritsch (Augsburg) and Sasa Kalajdzic (Stuttgart).