1 out of 2 - I’ll take it! I saw that; didn’t seem like he felt pain but it’s hard to tell on TV. Not the most blatant, but when I saw the replay it seemed an OK call. (At least not the sheer clusterf$#& ending the FA Cup match at ManU today.) Interesting that their quality was that low in football. East Germany had the reputation of drugs and steroids but maybe that was only or primarily for individual sports, especially ‘track & field’ (well, ‘athletics’ as Euros call it.). Btw I’ve seen season 1 of The Weisensee Saga, found it interesting. OK, ready for more weekend predictions and insights now…
What could be better - A Bundesliga Haiku! Hope you dig it, iight. Success: Union ! Without manager flattie !! (Chapeau still desired.)
Leverkusen drop points so an 8 point gap going into the big game next weekend. If Bayern can win in Leverkusen, that's probably that.
Should Liverpool beat Everton in their game-in-hand (and why not) for a 9-pt EPL bulge, it’s dull at the top across Northern Europe. (Apologies to Eredivisie and Jupiler, I’ll start watching them more.)
Magdeburg vs Nürnberg 3-4 Unbelievable, Magdeburg! Best Away team (9W-1D-1L, 32-15 Goals) and Worst Home team (now together with Hertha, 0W-7D-3L, 12-18 Goals). Never seen anything like this before, together with the end of last season they haven't won at home now in 15 matches! Crazy match again, 1-0 ahead, then 1-3 behind, 2-3, 3-3 and in the 95th minute 3-4. I'll keep my fingers crossed for next weeks home match against Köln, though What better way to end this horrendous home streak than against a direct promotion candidate. The other worst home team, Hertha Berlin, lost this evening 0-1 against Kaiserslautern ( 2nd, level on points with HSV). Coach sacking incoming.... Sunday it's Köln vs Schalke. One of the very rare occasions that I want Schalke to win. edit: Just checked it, last home win for Magdeburg was at the 21st matchday last season, so exactly a season ago, 1-0 vs St.Pauli edit2: Correction, Magdeburg wasn't 1-0 ahead but already 0-1 behind after 5mins. It's late, I should go to bed instead of mixing the facts. Anyway, still a crazy match
Another win for Köln against Schalke. 3rd in a row now which is a pattern for them. They usually don't win that 4th game (either draw or loss) so put your house on them not winning at Magdeburg next week (they probably will now that I've posted this). Hamburg are keeping even the form is not as good but still it's 4 wins from the last 5. Then we have Lautern in 3rd and then shock, horror a mamooth 3-pt gap between 3rd & 4th! Not counting the rest of the pack but all the Magdeburg, Düsseldorf & Paderborn are struggling to win back-to-back games... Must say, I have very little interest in the Buli this season. Bayern have the title sorted, Bayer have 2nd spot sorted and the rest of the league is a bit shit if I'm honest. Frankfurt & Stuttgart are 3rd & 4th respectively and both of them got heavily spanked by French opposition recently which says a lot about their quality. Less said about BvB the better (ex-schwab player Anton tried very hard to facilitate things for his old club what with an awful backpass and an own goal). At the bottom, only Pauli are trying hard to get out of the bottom I reckon, the rest are just shit. Only entertaining thing to come out of this would be Hoffenheim getting relegated after 17 consecutive seasons in the Buli but can't see it somehow (reckon they'd win the play-off if they somehow finish 16th). In the Drei, we drew 1-1 vs Ingolstadt, a good result considering Audi FC is 4th and we're, er, nowhere near that. Cottbus & Dresden in the top 2 spots at the moment.
Seems for you every club is shit which isn't competing in the top? No, it doesn't! Do you think that losing against a french team is an indicator that the Bundesliga team has no quality? Do you have such a low opinion about clubs from your own league? I'll give you the spank of Stuttgart in the last CL match against PSG with 1-4. They were simply too green in some of the CL matches (not all, though) after a, what, 15 year absence of CL? But they are far from being shit, especially in the Bundesliga which they showed again yesterday winning at Borussia Dortmund (where new coach Niko Kovac had a "good" debut ) And the "spanking" of Eintracht Frankfurt? They lost 2-3 away in Lyon. Hardly a spanking, though (btw that was their first loss in the EL after 18 unbeaten matches). Yet they managed to qualify without problems directly for the knockout rounds of the Europa League as 5th (btw ahead of Lyon). A "shit club" won't qualify. That they can't win atm in the Bundesliga and only draw their matches has also something to do that they lost their top scorer Omar Marmoush to Man City for something like 70m € in January. btw: Bloody Köln. Again a 1-0 win (how often now?) and jumping ahead of HSV at #1.
Yes. Buli sides usually beat Ligue 1 sides comfortably because they are simply better. Losing to Lyon this season is pretty bad if you watched them on a weekly basis. I'll back my claims with some stats compared to last season but to me the general level of play is not great in 24/25.
I have to admit that I don't watch the Ligue 1 (not because of no interest but simply because it's not shown here, only on DAZN I think which I won't subscribe to) but I just checked the Ligue 1 standings and see that Lyon is currently 6th with 33pts at an European spot and so far only 4 pts away from qualifying for the CL (ok PSG is already miles ahead of everybody with 53pts (similar to Bayern here) but maybe they can reach Nizza (37pts)) and they qualified directly, too, for the k.o rounds of the Europa League as 6th. I wouldn't say that this is "pretty bad"
Of course they happen to have their most comprehensive win of the season this afternoon (4-0 vs Reims)! Nah in all honesty Lyon have had a terrible season by their standards but the league has been so shit that they're not far from the European places. We had major trouble with DAZN who were the only ones willing to pay for the TV rights and the amount paid is far, FAR lower than whatever Canal Plus was paying a decade ago. Things are bad, man. Seriously.
Just read something about it: Niko Kovac is the 1st Borussia Dortmund coach since 2007 who couldn't win his first match with Borussia (and they had quite a few in this timespan)! Plus: As Coach he lost so far all of his matches at the Westfalenstadion (aka Dingsbums Arena): 2-times lost with Eintracht Frankfurt 2-times lost with Bayern München 2-times lost with VfL Wolfsburg and now 1 loss with Borussia itself That's quite some stat (I'm sure eventually he'll win one in Dortmund with Dortmund, though)
Friday matches (yeah, I know I'm a bit early here but no time tomorrow) 1.BL That's #12 vs #4 . Augsburg in the "no-mans land" of the standings. No danger for relegation but also no (or very little) hope for European spots. Leipzig on the other hand will try to strenghten their CL spot. ..... tbh I'm not interested in this match 2.BL #6 Paderborn vs #15 Münster: Paderborn still in the promotion race and Preußen needs every points to stay away from the relegation spots #4 Magdeburg vs #1 Köln: This is a 'must watch' match for me. Will Magdeburg at last win a home match after nearly a year or will the "1-0 win trickster" doing it again? for Magdeburg (would also be good for HSV)
You’ve been chronicling this stupefyingly unlikely and odd Magdeburg streak for a while. It is truly remarkable. It outshines, I think, the utter strangeness I chronicled last season in the Serie A thread for Udinese, but there are some loose parallels I would like to point out because Fün Fâcts are what it’s all about, really. HOME games: Udinese only won 1 of 19 at home; Magdeburg none as yet, but both were hobbled by too many home draws, losing 2 pts on so many occasions: Udinese had 11, Magdeburg 7 so far. AWAY games: Magdeburg way better away, with all 9 victories on the road and only 1 loss. Udinese as well, 5 of 6 season victories as road warriors. Most extraordinary was that 3 of their 5 wins were at top-flight clubs: AC Milan (2nd), Juventus (3rd), Lazio (7th) ! Yet beating low or middling clubs was a rarity! Magdeburg cannot do so on their home ground, anyway. (Magdeburg v Köln available here tomorrow, yay.) As retired American talk show host and comedian David Letterman frequently said when chronicling strange happenings: You can’t make this stuff up.
We have a Bundesliga Bonanza on Sky Sports Mix this weekend starting with Augsburg v Leipzig tonight & then 3 live back to back matches on Sunday , I doubt I'll bother getting dressed just doss on sofa for the afternoon . As for tonight , I'll go 2-1 Augsburg win , no point Leipzig getting into Europe again , they're terrible when they do , talking of Europe , how good was Dortmund's result at Sporting in the week .
