Schalke next as Steaua pursue elusive victory

FC Schalke 04 were 3-0 victors against FC Steaua Bucureşti on matchday one and will be seeking to respond to successive defeats by Chelsea FC with another victory against a home side still awaiting their first Group E win.

• Steaua looked to be holding their own in the 18 September fixture before Schalke seized the initiative via an Atsuto Uchida cross (67). The home team then scored twice more through Kevin-Prince Boateng (78) and Julian Draxler (85).

• The Romanian champions followed that with a 4-0 home defeat against Chelsea before putting their first point – and goal – on the board in a 1-1 draw with FC Basel 1893 in Bucharest. They were minutes away from that first victory in Switzerland only for Basel to earn a 1-1 draw in added time, leaving Steaua on two points at the foot of the table. 

• Schalke won 1-0 in Basel on matchday two but then lost 3-0 home and away to Chelsea and have six points, three behind the Blues.

Previous meetings
• The sides met in the 2011/12 UEFA Europa League group stage when it ended 0-0 in Cluj-Napoca, Schalke winning 2-1 in Germany. Kyriakos Papadopoulos (25) put the German side ahead and although Raul Rusescu quickly equalised (33), Raúl González (57) scored Schalke's winner.

• The teams in Romania on 15 September 2011 were:
Steaua: Tătăruşanu, Brandán, Latovlevici, Gardoş, M Costea (Nikolić 80), Bourceanu, Galamaz, Prepeliţă (Rusescu 67), Geraldo Alves, Tănase (F Costea 90), Tatu.
Schalke: Fährmann, Papadopoulos, Höwedes, Uchida, Fuchs, Matip, Farfán (Baumjohann 80), Holtby, Raúl, Huntelaar, Marica (Draxler 73).

• Steaua's long winless run against German teams continued last season when they were paired with VfB Stuttgart in the UEFA Europa League group stage, going down 5-1 in Bucharest after a 2-2 draw away.

• Their 17 fixtures against German sides have ended W1 D6 L10; at home it is W1 D3 L3.

• Steaua's lone victory came in the second leg of the 1957/58 European Champion Clubs' Cup first round, beating Borussia Dortmund 3-1. They had lost the away leg 4-2 and went down 3-1 in the replay on neutral ground in Bologna. It was the first of 14 games spanning almost 56 years against Bundesliga sides in which they have failed to win.

• Schalke met FC Sportul Studenţesc Bucureşti in the 1976/77 UEFA Cup second round, winning 1-0 away and 4-0 at home in their only previous tie against a Romanian side.

Match background
• Steaua are the only Romanian club to have won the European Cup, defeating FC Barcelona in a penalty shoot-out in the 1986 final.

• This is their first time in the group stage since 2008/09 and their seventh campaign overall. In those 40 matches they have amassed just four wins and 13 draws.

• Their last victory came at FC Dynamo Kyiv on 13 September 2006, since when they have recorded 15 defeats and six draws. At home they have not won in four campaigns including this one, their last success a 1-0 defeat of RTS Widzew Łódź on 16 October 1996.

• Their away form served Laurenţiu Reghecampf's team well in this season's qualifying rounds, a 2-2 draw at Legia Warszawa taking them through the play-offs on away goals after a 1-1 home draw. They also won at FK Vardar (2-1) and FC Dinamo Tbilisi (2-0).

• In their sixth group stage campaign, Schalke have emerged as winners of their section in their past two UEFA Champions League participations.

• After a 1-1 home draw with PAOK FC in the play-offs, Jens Keller's Schalke survived Jermaine Jones' red card to win 3-2 in Greece.

• Schalke were unbeaten in four away games (W2 D2) in last season's competition and the matchday four defeat at Chelsea  was just their second in their last 13 European away fixtures.

• Last season they won at Olympiacos FC (2-1) and Arsenal FC (2-0) before drawing 1-1 away to Montpellier Hérault SC and Galatasaray AŞ, losing 3-2 at home to the Turkish team in the round of 16 second leg.

Team ties
• Steaua coach Reghecampf had spells as a player in Germany at FC Energie Cottbus, Alemannia Aachen and 1. FC Kaiserslautern. In seven meetings with Schalke he suffered six defeats with a solitary victory.

• He came up against Keller, who played for 1. FC Köln (2000-2002) and Eintracht Frankfurt (2002-2005).

• As assistant coach, Keller's VfB Stuttgart eliminated FC Timişoara in the 2009/10 UEFA Champions League play-offs with a 2-0 aggregate victory. Alexandru Bourceanu and Iasmin Latovlevici were with Timişoara at the time.

• Łukasz Szukała has both Polish and German citizenship. He started with SV Eintracht Trier 05's youth team before playing for TSV 1860 München and Aachen.

• Substitute Alexandru Chipciu scored an added-time equaliser to earn Romania a 2-2 draw against Szalai's Hungary in a 2014 FIFA World Cup 2014 qualifier in Budapest on 22 March 2013. Ciprian Tătăruşanu, Mihai Pintilii and Alexandru Bourceanu also featured for the visitors.

• Klaas-Jan Huntelaar scored in the Netherlands' 2-0 win over Romania in the UEFA EURO 2008 group stage in Berne. 

• Fernando Varela's Cape Verde Islands lost 2-0 in the quarter-finals of the Africa Cup of Nations on 2 February 2013 in Port Elizabeth against a Ghana team who had Anthony Annan on the bench.