On Friday the Bundesliga comes out of a short winter break – what we can look forward to when it restarts and what we can hope for in the new year.
19 game days left
First of all: there are still 19 match days left. Because the league said goodbye to the winter break shortly before Christmas after the 15th round. There is a full program right at the beginning of the year, because after the opening weekend (January 10th to 12th) there is an English week.
Two great games right at the start
And it gets off to a lively start. There are two top games on the program for the restart. On Friday (from 8:30 p.m. in the full radio report and in the live ticker at the Sportschau) Borussia Dortmund and champions Bayer Leverkusen open the new year. The classic between Borussia Mönchengladbach and FC Bayern Munich continues on Saturday.
Exciting fight for the championship
FC Bayern Munich goes into the new year as league leaders. The record champions have 36 points to their name, defending champions Bayer Leverkusen have collected four points less. After a slow start, the Werkself gradually stalked the Munich team.
There is a lot to suggest that both teams will be up there until the end and fight for the championship between themselves. The rest of the competition lacks consistency and class. This was evident shortly before Christmas when Bayern dispatched their challengers from Leipzig 5-1. Borussia Dortmund has been a surprise bag recently, Eintracht Frankfurt ran out of steam in December. The direct duel between Bayern and Bayer will take place in mid-February on matchday 23 in Leverkusen.
Scramble for the European Cup places
Well, a four-way battle for the championship would be more exciting. Conversely, this means that the scramble for the European Cup places is becoming more intense. And it’s not just Leipzig, Frankfurt and Dortmund that have demands. Because currently even eleventh-placed VfL Wolfsburg can have hopes for this. The “Wolves” are just six points behind third place Frankfurt in the tight table. Mainz 05, Werder Bremen, Borussia Mönchengladbach, SC Freiburg and VfB Stuttgart are also still involved in the fight for the international places.
Life in the relegation battle again
Yes, the table doesn’t bode well for VfL Bochum. The team is bottom of the table with just six points, and is already eight points short of 15th place. The penultimate team from Kiel is no better off with eight points. But both teams brought life back into the relegation battle shortly before the winter break. The Bochum team defeated 1. FC Heidenheim 2-0, Kiel defeated FC Augsburg 5-1. And FC St. Pauli, as a promoted team and already a problem child on paper, also celebrated a 1-0 win at VfB Stuttgart.
Things will be exciting one day before the league restarts. On Thursday, the DFB sports court will negotiate the rating of the game between Union Berlin and VfL Bochum. VfL objected to the game being scored because goalkeeper Patrick Drewes was hit in the head with a lighter shortly before the end. The game in December ended 1-1.
With two more points from the “green table”, the Bochum team would be level on points with Kiel, and Union would be right in the middle of the relegation fray with one point less, twelfth in the table and six points ahead of the relegation place.
New faces and returnees
But perhaps Steffen Baumgart will make things better in Berlin. The coach took over the team from Köpenick during the winter break and is back in the football upper house after eleven months with the second division club Hamburger SV.
And something was already happening on the transfer market. First and foremost, 1. FC Heidenheim struck. The Georgian European Championship participant Budu Zivzivadze, top scorer in the 2nd Bundesliga with twelve goals, comes from Karlsruher SC and is supposed to shoot the Heidenheimers out of the relegation battle.
TSG Hoffenheim is also hoping for plenty of goals from Gift Orban. The people from Kraichgau invested at least nine million euros in the 22-year-old Nigerian, who was from Olympique Lyon comes. The transfer window only closes on February 3rd.
The 1,000 goal mark could fall
445 goals were scored on the first 15 matchdays. The goal average was 3.3 goals per game. If things continue like this, the 1,000-goal mark would be broken at the end of the season for the first time in 40 years. Extrapolated, it would be exactly 1,009 hits.
Let’s hope that the Bundesliga professionals pick up on the last matchday before the winter break. There were 37 goals, making it the highest-scoring matchday of the season so far.