Hamburg coach Bruno Labbadia has called on his side to "put their foot down" heading into the match against Bochum.

The north German side currently lie third in the table, just three points adrift of leaders Bayer Leverkusen.

They host Bochum tomorrow knowing a win could take them back into a share of top spot and, after a fortnight's international break, Labbadia wants his players to redouble their efforts ahead of the winter break.

"We want to stay up there and for that to happen, we have got to beat teams like Bochum at home," he said.

"We have played a convincing season so far and now we want to put our foot down once again before the winter break."

Nevertheless, Labbadia has warned against under-estimating tomorrow's opponents who he believes will be a lot stronger than their league position of 17th suggests.

"(Bochum coach) Heiko Herrlich has had 14 days to talk about things that he has not been happy with and he hardly had any players away for international games, and for a new coach, this period of time is worth its weight in gold," said Labbadia.

Herrlich has lost his first two games in charge, 2-1 to Eintracht Frankfurt and Freiburg, but has now had enough time to get to know his players better, and he is impressed with what he has seen.

"The will and the desire to turn things around is there," he said. "We are not going to Hamburg just to savour the occasion. We want to take something tangible away with us."

Herrlich has a practically fully-fit squad to choose from with only Kevin Vogt and Philipp Bonig unavailable.

The same cannot be said for Labbadia, though, as Hamburg's injury problems continue to grow.

Jonathan Pitroipa is the latest player on the injured list, joining Mladen Petric, Marcus Berg and Ze Roberto on the sidelines.