The “English Week” (so called as in the older days the Germans noticed that the old English top flight often played mid-week, which impressed the Germans so much that they decided to try it themselves once in a while.) Anyway, this round re-affirmed some of the trends noticeable on the previous Saturday. Bayern is strong, Frankfurt remains impressive, Dortmund still shaky, and the crap teams are perhaps recovering.
Bayern München continues their perfect start, as they had no problems with a lame Wolfsburg squad, who could have easily been beaten by twice the score. Ex-Wolfsburg Mario Mandzukic must have enjoyed his double. Felix Magath is clearly failing at VW-Stadt. They should probably fire his ass, since he’s not going to repeat the achievements of his first stay, but he’ll continue to spend tons of money.
A wild shootout in Dortmund between sensational Frankfurt and champions Dortmund. The Neons came out solid and looked like they had the match won by halftime. Eintracht threw caution into the wind and stormed back, as Dortmund’s defense continues to look shaky. Probably a fair result based on Eintracht’s effort, but like the loss in Hamburg, Dortmund must feel they should have gotten more out of this one.
Schalke was not impressive against Mainz. In fact, the visitors controlled large segments of the match. Of course, they did squat, and although struggling at times, at least the Blues remembered to score some goals.
Düsseldorf still hasn’t allowed a goal, and they knocked hosts Fürth out in the first half with a couple of goals. The Greuther completely fell asleep and Fortuna kicked them in the nuts. In the 2nd half, the hosts improved their play immensely, pressuring Düsseldorf back, but clearly it’s going to take somebody more competant than the Greuther to score against a well organized Fortuna squad.
Hamburg looks recovered. The return of favorite Rafael van der Vaart has had the hoped for effect, and HSV has raised their game immensely. They totally outplayed a confused Gladbach, and had the match won, but they fell asleep in injury time and gave up a bitter goal. Still, after their early season sucking, HSV seems to have turned the corner, and should be a tough opponent going forward. Gladbach seems without ideas and needs a kick in the ass.
Another squad might have woken up as well. Hoffenheim gets another win, and their bad start is only a memory. They also may have found their own mini-Kagawa, as Takashi Usami becomes the latest Japanese player to start making a name for himself in the Bundesliga. The host Stuttgarters were embarassingly bad, so Hoffenheim shouldn’t crow too much. Still, for embattled coach Markus Babbel, htings look quite rosy compared to only two matches ago…
It was apparently Nürnberg’s turn to deliver a stinker, and boy, did it reek. It’s just what the doctor ordered for host Hannover, coming off a embarassing performance at Hoffenheim. Nürnberg gifted the 96ers goals, and the hosts happily accepted, kicking der Club in the ass. Another fine match for Hungarian Szabolcs Hustzi.
Bremen looked crap against Freiburg, and was losing to boot. Last year they probably would have folded and given up several more goals and gotten disgraced. But so far, this year’s Werder is a different beast, much more discplined. Bremen fought back in the 2nd and were rewarded with the lead. Freiburg might have deserved a draw, playing decently, but they wasted their chances, so perhaps they deserve to lose.
It takes a good supply of Bayer products like Aspirin and Alka-Seltzer to watch Luserkusen. Could they be any more uninspired? They don’t really seem to care. But they’re playing an incompetant side in Augsburg, so they needed to generate only a couple of chances and score, and it’s over. FCA runs around a lot, but they can’t score, and in the Bundesliga, that means you’re probably going down. It shouldn’t really be a surprise, as this (even last year) is basically a decent 2.Liga squad. I still can’t figure
out Leverkusen though. They show once in a while that they’re capable of clever football, but most of the time it seems like they could give a crap.
Bayern München - VfL Wolfsburg 3:0 (1:0) 71,000
1:0 Schweinsteiger (24.,Ribery)
2:0 Mandzukic (57., Shaqiri)
3:0 Mandzukic (65., Lahm)
FC Schalke 04 - 1. FSV Mainz 05 3:0 (1:0) 59,116
1:0 Farfan (21., penalty, Höwedes)
2:0 Holtby (81., Fuchs)
3:0 Pukki (89., Draxler)
SpVgg Greuther Fürth - Fortuna Düsseldorf 0:2 (0:2) 16,573
0:1 O. Fink (26., J. van den Bergh)
0:2 Ilsö (33.)
Eintracht Frankfurt - Borussia Dortmund 3:3 (0:2) 51,500
0:1 Piszczek (25., Hummels)
0:2 Reus (28., Piszczek)
1:2 Aigner (49., Inui)
2:2 Inui (51., Aigner)
2:3 M. Götze (54.)
3:3 Anderson (73., Oczipka)
Borussia M'gladbach - Hamburger SV 2:2 (1:2) 46,233
0:1 van der Vaart (23., Westermann)
1:1 Stranzl (39., Nordtveit)
1:2 Rudnevs (45., Badelj)
2:2 Alvaro Dominguez (90. + 1, Arango)
VfB Stuttgart - 1899 Hoffenheim 0:3 (0:1) 41,720
0:1 Usami (5.,)
0:2 Joselu (47., Roberto Firmino)
0:3 Johnson (58., Usami)
Hannover 96 - 1. FC Nürnberg 4:1 (2:0) 36,200
1:0 Stindl (21., Huszti)
2:0 Huszti (29.)
3:0 Ya Konan (52.,)
4:0 Ya Konan (64., Huszti)
4:1 Chandler (73., Feulner)
SC Freiburg - Werder Bremen 1:2 (1:0) 23,000
1:0 Schmid (36.)
1:1 Akpala (48., Arnautovic)
1:2 Hunt (59., de Bruyne)
FC Augsburg - Bayer Leverkusen 1:3 (0:3) 25,211
0:1 Kießling (7., Castro)
0:2 Wollscheid (39., Toprak)
0:3 Schürrle (44.)
1:3 Werner (51., Baier)
1 Bayern München 5 5 0 0 17:2 +15 15
2 Eintracht Frankfurt (N) 5 4 1 0 14:7 +7 13
3 Hannover 96 5 3 1 1 14:8 +6 10
4 FC Schalke 04 5 3 1 1 10:5 +5 10
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5 Fortuna Düsseldorf (N) 5 2 3 0 4:0 +4 9
6 Borussia Dortmund (M, P) 5 2 2 1 11:8 +3 8
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7 Werder Bremen 5 2 1 2 9:8 +1 7
8 Bayer Leverkusen 5 2 1 2 7:7 0 7
9 1. FC Nürnberg 5 2 1 2 7:9 -2 7
10 Borussia M'gladbach 5 1 3 1 7:7 0 6
11 1899 Hoffenheim 5 2 0 3 10:12 -2 6
12 SC Freiburg 5 1 2 2 7:8 -1 5
13 VfL Wolfsburg 5 1 2 2 2:8 -6 5
14 Hamburger SV 5 1 1 3 7:10 -3 4
15 1. FSV Mainz 05 5 1 1 3 4:8 -4 4
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16 SpVgg Greuther Fürth (N) 5 1 1 3 2:8 -6 4
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17 VfB Stuttgart 5 0 2 3 3:12 -9 2
18 FC Augsburg 5 0 1 4 2:10 -8 1