2013-14 German Bundesliga Thread: Bayern Champs Again

Andre3822 · Post #481 » by **Andre3822** » Sun Oct 27, 2013 11:20 pm

Just a random thought, Bundesliga is pretty much the most competitive and intense league in the world in my opinion and Bayern/Dortmund are the clear cut 1# and 2# team in the world.

I find Dortmund's starting 11 is greater than Bayern's, but the exception here is that Bayern runs 25 deep with literally minimal drop-off, which makes it so spectacular and that's why I think they'll last longer than Dortmund in all fronts.

Nuri Sahin is THE COMPLETE package, he has regained his confidence and is looking sharper than ever, those long balls are out of this world...

I expect him and Gündogan to dominate the midfield for years to come.

Anyway cheers everybody, let's hope this season will be as intense as last time!

Post #482 » by **Next Coming** » Sun Oct 27, 2013 11:28 pm

Foye wrote:Gladbach with an easy 4-1 home victory over Frankfurt. 5 home games, 5 victories.

Now their away record...a draw and 4 losses.

If they can somehow fix their road allergy I consider them a strong thread for 4th place. Gladbach, Wolfsburg and Schalke will battle for 4th. Normally, Schalke should be the favourite but not with their current injury curse.

Yeah what's up with the knee injuries??? Snake bit at the moment.

Foye · Post #483 » by **Foye** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 12:08 am

Next Coming wrote:
Foye wrote:Gladbach with an easy 4-1 home victory over Frankfurt. 5 home games, 5 victories.

Now their away record...a draw and 4 losses.

If they can somehow fix their road allergy I consider them a strong thread for 4th place. Gladbach, Wolfsburg and Schalke will battle for 4th. Normally, Schalke should be the favourite but not with their current injury curse.

Yeah what's up with the knee injuries??? Snake bit at the moment.

It's a vicious circle. They have maybe 15 quality players for a season of Bundesliga, DFB Pokal and CL.
Papa wasn't healthy to start the season....14
Huntelaar injured early in the season....13
Höger torn ACL out for season.....12

Then there are all the minor injuries. Farfan is still out for the week.
Draxler had hamstring problems twice already this season.
Boateng has trouble with his knee but they can't afford to leave him out for a game...his knee is probably like a time bomb waiting for the explosion right now.

And with each player that goes down to injury...the likelihood of the others getting injured as well increases because they have to play more minutes.

Spots 1 to 3 are already gone for Schalke. No way they can get back 10 points on Bayern, BVB or even Leverkusen. Just not enough depth on the roster to win many games in a row. They should aim to survive the group stages in the CL and keep the difference between 4th position and themselves as low as possible.
It's kind of a shame because I believe they have a nice squad (other than maybe the defensive midfield) in place when everybody is healthy.
Well, at least Papa is back in the training squad.

I'm a huge fan what Schalke did in the offseason. Boateng very good transfer. Goretzka very talented guy for next to nothing. Szalai is a solid striker, too. And picked up Santana for just 1 mil.
After the departure of Raffael, Bastos and Afellay they are still 3 quality players away from the depth situation they need for 3 competitions, though.

Point forward · Post #484 » by **Point forward** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 11:34 am

Today at 13h German time, the DFB will decide whether the "phantom goal game" of Hoffenheim - Leverkusen will be replayed. Quote of the day:

DFB judge wrote:Are you happy that the DFB finally called you up, Mr. Kießling?

Stefan Kießling wrote:I don't know if I need to answer that question.

Point forward · Post #485 » by **Point forward** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 11:48 am

Foye wrote:
Point forward wrote:Oliver Baumann completes the goalie triple of horror: underestimates a harmless cross (HSV scores the 1:0), then drops the ball in the box (HSV scores the 2:0) and then fails to grab a soft shot (HSV scores the 3:0).

Baumann has made far too many errors this season so far. He needs to regain last seasons form or Freiburg will be in much deeper trouble than they currently are already.

Apparently, Baumann was so depressed after the game that the ref hugged him and said: "Now you know how it feels to be a ref." :lol:

Foye · Post #486 » by **Foye** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 12:22 pm

Point forward wrote:Today at 13h German time, the DFB will decide whether the "phantom goal game" of Hoffenheim - Leverkusen will be replayed. Quote of the day:

DFB judge wrote:Are you happy that the DFB finally called you up, Mr. Kießling?

Stefan Kießling wrote:I don't know if I need to answer that question.

Damn the judge is an awesome troll.

Point forward · Post #487 » by **Point forward** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 1:42 pm

As expected, no replay of the Hoffenheim-Leverkusen match. I found it extremely interesting what the judge had to say:

Following the current laws of soccer, a goal is scored when the referee decides to give it. Whether the referee is wrong is totally irrelevant. Following the current soccer laws, his decision is absolute. If you want to change the goal, you have to change the law behind it.

and

My wife will scold me for this verdict. The entire goal giving laws are systematically wrong.

I bet that this verdict would have been 100% the same if Bayern or Dortmund had been the victim! I mean, Bayern never had a replay game before!

J-Mezzy · Post #488 » by **J-Mezzy** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 2:01 pm

Well time to change the laws of goal.

cgf · Post #489 » by **cgf** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 6:24 pm

Leverkusen are pretty paper thin themselves. If Keissling missed time the way Hunter has Leverkusen would drop like a rock.

Foye · Post #490 » by **Foye** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 6:37 pm

cgf wrote:Leverkusen are pretty paper thin themselves. If Keissling missed time the way Hunter has Leverkusen would drop like a rock.

Luckily for them Kießling is like invulnerable.

As long as they have three of Kießling, Sam, Castro and Son on the pitch they will do well. At least in the Bundesliga.

cgf · Post #491 » by **cgf** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 6:50 pm

Yeah but that's one those things that's true until it's not. If he went down in February they'd be lucky to hold onto a EL spot.

Especially since I see Gladbach and Schalke beating them in their head to heads, Gladbach put in a good effort on the road to Leverkusen and were undone by a couple massive mistakes, with the return at home where Gladbach are unbeatable, I see BMG taking the 3 points from that match up, and Schalke already beat Bayer once before to end their mini-crisis to start the season. That's 6 points of their 9 and 10 point lead over BMG and Schalke taken down. If Keissling just missed a couple weeks on top of that that would be enough to knock them out of a CL place if Gladbach start winning on the road and Schalke can keep pace until the winter break and find some reinforcements to flush out the roster. Plus Meyer is growing with each game and soon Goretzka to will be a regular starter, with Papa coming back and Farfan just a week or two away, Leverkusen may not be able to stretch their lead any further and it could become a question of holding onto what they've already built up from here on out.

Foye · Post #492 » by **Foye** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 7:34 pm

10 points is a pretty comfortable lead to be honest.

Schalke and Gladbach need to go on a winning streak sooner than later if they want to get back on striking distance.

Post #493 » by **Next Coming** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 8:35 pm

If Leverkusen don't make it out of CL group stages does the probability of Bender leaving go up or would Hyypiä refuse all enquiries? How much would he command? I keep on hearing about a £16M release clause.

Foye · Post #494 » by **Foye** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 8:42 pm

IMO the possibility that he is sold in winter is 0%.

MaliBrah · Post #495 » by **MaliBrah** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 9:28 pm

just a quick question to the german guys , how well regarded is serge gnabry down there? and how do germans see him as a talent?

Foye · Post #496 » by **Foye** » Mon Oct 28, 2013 10:01 pm

MaliBrah wrote:just a quick question to the german guys , how well regarded is serge gnabry down there? and how do germans see him as a talent?

He is flying under the radar in German media because most of them only focus on men soccer teams and of course mainly Bundesliga teams.
Him entering and performing well in Arsenals first team hasn't gone unnoticed, though.

Same with Eisfeld. Almost nobody knew him until he made his first appearance for Arsenal's first team.

MaliBrah · Post #497 » by **MaliBrah** » Tue Oct 29, 2013 4:38 am

I see , yeah gnabry has been filling in pretty nicely in the first team and has been making immediate impact , just signed a 5 year deal and he has a pretty good future at arsenal. Hope he can develop enough to be a mainstay in the national team. He's been scoring regularly for the u19 team he's on. As eisfeld , kid always has an impact on the game , one of those players that just manage to sneak in and score every time lol

Point forward · Post #498 » by **Point forward** » Tue Oct 29, 2013 9:52 am

Gnabry is a RW, meaning that he faces some stiff competition in the NT: I would put Müller, Schürrle, and at least Volland and Großkreutz ahead of him. If he plays attacking MF, I won't even get started. My greatest concern is that Ivory Coast could claim him. Gnabry plays in the German U19, but he would not be the first poached junior German international (Choupo-Moting, Kolasinac, Jones etc.).

Edit: I really like Gnabry, and I hope that he does not go off the rails like the last Afro-German prodigy, Savio Nsereko :-?

cgf · Post #499 » by **cgf** » Tue Oct 29, 2013 4:09 pm

I just don't see it with Gnabry, his play is too linear and direct, like Podolski and Schurrle, I don't see the cleverness in his motion the way you do with your Werner's, Meyer's, Volland's, etc. But Arsenal under wenger are as good a bet as any for him to culture his game.

Foye · Post #500 » by **Foye** » Tue Oct 29, 2013 4:51 pm

Normally, a country should be happy if they have a few years of talented players in a row.

We had like the Neuer/Schweini/Lahm/Özil/Khedira/Boateng/Gomez generation....and follow it up with Götze/Reus/Gündogan/Draxler/Hummels/Müller/Schürrle/Bender/Kruse/Volland/Trapp/ter Stegen/Ginter/Herrmann.
On top of it the next generation of Meyer/Goretzka/Can/Werner/Arnold/Brandt/Gnabry is looking really good as well.

And I'm sure I forgot many players just now. This is shaping up to be at least a decade of producing great soccer players in a row. Awesome.