When Austria equalised against Poland with virtually the last kick of the game thanks to a penalty decision that some referees may have shirked from, they managed to give themselves a faint glimmer of hope for qualification. But manager Josef Hickersberger is relying on a much improved performance by his forwards when the Austrians take on their neighbours Germany in their do-or-die Group B encounter.

Only the great performance of Poland’s goalkeeper Artur Boruc and the wastefulness of their attackers stopped Austria gaining the victory they deserved and thus contributed to an exciting finale with Vastic driving home the penalty to earn them their first-ever point in a European Championship game.

Obviously, for any chance of qualification, they will have to take all three points off the Germans on Monday, but Hickersberger remains upbeat stating that with the support of the fans, it won't be as one-sided against Germany as most people are expecting. He said that the performance against Poland was fantastic, especially in the first half but it was just a case of not taking their scoring opportunities.

Hickersberger played in Austria's one and only competitive win against the Germans in a 1978 World Cup match which halted West Germany's then advancement into the latter stages of the competition in Argentina. Even though the veteran trainer would love a repetition of that result on Monday, especially with playing on home soil, he point blank refused to make any historical comparisons. He said that the game was played so long ago that it had absolutely no bearing on what will happen in the upcoming Euro 2008 match, and he also made a point of saying that if any player thought that they had any kind of advantage over the Germans because of this, then they’d better get it out of their heads in the coming couple of days.