Bundesliga – Matchday 9 Review

Article by Bundesliga Correspondent Ed Hewings

A weekend that began in a controversy that will rumble on for many weeks (one feels) ended with a thrilling draw between Hamburg and Stuttgart, and saw the usual suspects of Dortmund and Bayern sitting atop the fledgling table.

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There is no other place to start a review of Matchday 10 than in the Rhein-Neckar Arena in Hoffenheim, where third placed Bayer Leverkusen visited Friday. A goal from Sidney Sam gave Leverkusen the lead at half team, but in the 70th minute, Stefan Kieβling scored. Or did he? Well, no. The Phantom Goal, originally the brainchild of Stuart Attwell, has received a German sequel.

However, unlike the English Championship, Germany has a precedent when it comes to this kind of incident – a similar incident involving Bayern Munich a few years back led to the replay of the game, ordered by the German FA. Hoffenheim have lodged a protest, and so expect a replay of this game in the not-so-distant future. Leverkusen went on to win the game 2-1, with Kieβling’s goal ultimately proving to be the winner, taking them temporarily to the top of the Bundesliga.

On Saturday, Bayern played host to FSV Mainz, and went in at half time 1-0 down to a shock goal from the youngster Shawn Parker. However, Guardiola weaved his tactical magic and replaced right-back Rafinha with Mario Gotze, who has had little opportunity to impress this season. Gotze ran the show from thereon in, with Robben, Mandzukic and Muller (twice, with one penalty) getting on the scoresheet in a 4-1 win. How Bayern will line up now with Gotze coming to the party is anyone’s guess.

Dortmund were made to work a little harder on their Saturday afternoon at the Signal Iduna Park. An early Marco Reus penalty had everyone thinking that a comfortable victory over Hannover96 would ensue – there were several nervy moments, but Dortmund held on for the remaining 86mins to register a 1-0 win.

Elsewhere, bottom club Eintracht Braunschweig fought hard, but ultimately fell to a 91st minute winner from Schalke 04 midfielder Roman Neustadter – little reward for them having gone 1-0 and then 2-1 ahead.

Eintracht Frankfurt and FC Nurnberg played out a 1-1 draw, with the equaliser for Nurnberg coming in the 86th minute from Drmic – however, that point does nothing for Nurnberg, as they remain in the relegation zone, 3 points from safety.

In the battle of the Brazilian brothers Ronnie and Raffael in the Hertha Berlin vs Borussia Monchengladbach, Ronnie came out on top, with a lone goal from Adrian Ramos being the difference, to take the team from Berlin up into 4th.

Wolfsburg (title winners as recently as 2009) ran out 2-1 winners over FC Augsburg in Bavaria, with Luis Gustavo scoring the winner at the end of the first half.

The Bundesliga registered it’s first 0-0 draw of the season, between Werder Bremen and SC Freiburg – that will do nothing for Werder’s confidence, yet will do wonders for Freiburg’s given the latters standing in the relegation zone.

So, Bayern lead on 23 points, with Dortmund and Leverkusen chasing on 22. Hertha Berlin lead the best of the rest, however a somewhat distant 7 points back from Leverkusen. Eintracht Braunschweig, Freiburg and Nurnberg prop up the table, with Hamburg looking somewhat nervously over their shoulders in 17th.

The pick of next week’s fixtures see Borussia Dortmund travel to Schalke, and Wolfsburg meet Werder Bremen in the Saturday evening kickoff.

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