Guardiola wary of Hamburg threat

Bayern Munich may be streets ahead of Hamburg in the Bundesliga, but Pep Guardiola remains wary ahead of their DFB-Pokal clash on Wednesday.

After nine league games, top-of-the-table Bayern already have a 15-point advantage over Hamburg, who are in the bottom three.

However, Hamburg did manage to take a point from Bayern in September’s meeting, ending a run of five successive defeats in matches against the German champions.

And Guardiola insists Bayern will not take the threat of Josef Zinnbauer’s side lightly in the cup.

“I’m proud of my team, we’re well placed,” the head coach said.

“We have a big challenge ahead of us. It’s a final, and the cup is always dangerous for the big teams.

“Either we can continue – or we’re out.

“The Hamburg players run very much and are very aggressive; we’ve seen that in the league.”

Bayern, who had six players named on the Ballon d’Or shortlist and Guardiola on the 10-man coach of the year list on Tuesday, will hope to reproduce the performance in last season’s quarter-final, a game they won 5-0.

Defender Mehdi Benatia is unavailable through suspension, but the visitors could welcome back Arjen Robben and Jerome Boateng.