Ambitious club in a hurry to progress has never accepted the idea of transitional seasons – so a 5-2 tonking is a blow
August turns out like it did a long time ago. On the warm night Harry Kane was brought to the ecstatic Allianz Arena, it was RB Leipzig who ran the show – and how.
At the time, newcomer Xavi Simons surprised his new enthusiasts with how smart he was, leaving Germany’s biggest club wondering why they didn’t have such a player and letting Paris Saint-Germain perhaps wonder why they had him. After his impressive Super Cup performance, the Dutch midfielder has spent much of the season giving the satisfying impression of being the most productive player in the Bundesliga, or close enough. However, on Saturday, at their direct rivals in Stuttgart, they had to do without him, suspended for receiving the fifth yellow card of the season against Leverkusen. And that game was about managing the hand of the staff you were handed out – or not, as the case may be. Possibly.
The home team had to deal with its own absence in the early primaries, but their reaction was overwhelming. Stuttgart have been the mouthpiece for the top four this season and still held a position in the Champions League at the start, despite successive defeats that gave the sensation. that they were experiencing a kind of backward leveling in their season. Instead, they sent Leipzig home with their tails between their legs, having secured their first win since top scorer Serhou Guirassy went to the Africa Cup of Nations, boosted instead by Deniz Undav’s hat-trick. It had previously been hinted that the striker’s goals on loan from Brighton could help them get through, particularly at the time when the Guinean was sidelined in the autumn with a hamstring injury. The truth is that without Guirassy in the Bundesliga this season, Stuttgart’s record was 4 games played, 4 lost. That streak was dramatically broken.
Some might have wondered if the quiet first few minutes of the match, as part of the latest fan protest against investment in personal equity in the Bundesliga, might have been suitable for the away team. However, as a driver frustrated by the works on the highway. And suddenly, freed from that obligation, the Cannstatter Kurve roared when it was time to hold the fire and Leipzig under the bomb. The score of 5-2 did not flatter Sebastian Hoeness’ team at all.
So while the coach and his Stuttgart team can continue to enjoy a pressure-free, playing-with-house-money second half of the season, far away from their typical battles against the drop, Leipzig face a completely contrasting scenario. There are days when they can look like the best team in the Bundesliga. Here, they were a rabble. Champions League qualification is a bare minimum, rather than the delightful daydream it is for Stuttgart. This, a third straight Bundesliga defeat in 2024, saw Leipzig drop out of the top four. Marco Rose, Leipzig-born-and-bred and coaching-wise a graduate of the Red Bull school, has seemed like the perfect fit since arriving in 2022, but the contract extension he signed in July won’t fool him. He must turn this around quickly, as previous incumbents like Jesse Marsch and Domenico Tedesco could tell him. This is a club that runs holistically but burns intensely with ambition.
Benjamin Sesko shows signs of being able to do for Leipzig what Undav can do for his opponents. His header, which brought RB back into the game in the first half, was one that turned him into him. he can be simply unstoppable, emerging effortlessly to drive David Raum’s delivery. But young Slovenian Sesko is learning. Undav’s composure is much more than just confidence, which sets him apart as someone who can be key for Germany at Euro 2024. There is a development in progress. I am confident that he is currently the top German professional finisher in the league.
Leipzig have someone equally prolific in Lois Openda, who briefly brought them back to this game with her 13th Bundesliga goal of the season, but they want more. Rose later told Sky that the key to the effects “is in our heads”. He knows it. His team wants to clarify those ideas urgently. A club in a hurry to progress has never accepted advice for transitional seasons or stages of progression, and probably wouldn’t start now.
Dortmund 3-1 Bochum, Union Berlin 1-0 Darmstadt, Leverkusen 0-0 Mönchengladbach, Augsburg 2-3 Bayern, Hoffenheim 1-1 Heidenheim, Stuttgart 5-2 RB Leipzig, Werder Bremen 3-1 Freiburg, Wolfsburg 1-1 Cologne, Eintracht Frankfurt 1-0 Mainz.
Bayern Munich’s week has been a satisfying if exacting one, with Saturday’s difficult 3-2 win at Augsburg closing the gap to the summit to two points after Wednesday night’s game in hand, a 1-0 victory over Union Berlin. There were positives for Thomas Tuchel and company, including a first Bundesliga goal for the increasingly impressive teenage midfielder Aleksandar Pavlovic and a first of the season for Alphonso Davies.
Harry Kane’s goal, which ultimately proved to be the winner, was his 23rd in the league and ended a (gasp!) run of two games without scoring. Less welcome is Kingsley Coman’s knee injury in the first half, which Tuchel says he will stay. The French winger is “for a while”. Bayern have at least reinforced a genuine need, confirming the signing of Coman compatriot Sacha Boey, a Galatasaray right-back, for an initial fee of €30 million. Raphael Guerreiro, winner of the match against the Union, had been deployed as an emergency substitute in the Augsburg position.
In what is perhaps the most loquacious situation in recent memory, the champions, who are not really acting, made up a few more questions about leaders Leverkusen, who only managed a goalless draw at home to Borussia Mönchengladbach despite a ridiculous maximum dominance point. at its highest point. Number of shots on target in a match over two years and complete your maximum assists in a match over 4 years. The upcoming signing of Spanish striker Borja Iglesias, on loan from Betis, deserves to fix some of those conversion problems.
At the back, Union picked up an important win after that midweek defeat, with a goal from Benedict Hollerbach beating defender Darmstadt, but without much style. Eyes were more focused off the pitch, with coach Nenad Bjelica in the dressing room of preaspectnt Dirk Zingler for the attack, suspended after his red card for shoving Leroy Sané in the face (twice) in Munich. Bjelica’s teammates, Danijel Jumic (as head coach) and Marie-Louise Eta (in the medium category), took note of the adjustment and will continue to do so in the remaining two fits of their suspension, so the challenge threatens to persist; Reports recommend that several players expressed their astonishment to the board of directors that Bjelica was allowed to keep his job.
Talking of not winning style points, Borussia Dortmund moved into the top four with a third straight win in 2024, but made heavy weather of beating Bochum in the “Little Derby”. A Niclas Füllkrug treble, including two penalties, did the job after an avoidable own goal by Nico Schlotterbeck had invited the impressive visitors back into the game. The mood in the BVB camp is a realistic one, with more improvement clearly needed but the run of wins against “exactly the sort of opponents we had problems against” nothing to be sniffed at, as Füllkrug was keen to point out.