BVB receive Stuttgart, Bayern in Hamburg
Every Football fan still has the match between Dortmund and Stuttgart from last campaign in mind. The legendary 4-4 draw with the lead changing three times took place on matchday 28. Now Stuttgart will be back in Signal-Iduna-Park on Saturday. FC Bayern will travel to Hamburg for the night match.
The last match between Dortmund and Stuttgart will not be forgotten too easily.
It was matchday 28 of the previous season. Dortmund looked like the easy winner being 2-0 in the lead against Stuttgart, but Vedad Ibisevic got one back for VFB and Julian Schieber who is in service of BVB nowadays turned the match during a couple of minutes scoring twice. Mats Hummels equalized for Dortmund and Ivan Perisic even scored the alleged winner just minutes before the end, but VFB´s Gentner equalized the score once more in the third minute of extra time. The final result of the crazy and extraordinary match was 4-4.
This Saturday history might repeat itself. At least the matchup is the same when Bruno Labbadia´s team is traveling to Dortmund. VFB got ten out of possible twelve points recently while Dortmund booked the first win on foreign grounds last week. Both teams are more or less on the uptick heading into Saturday´s match.
Fink is looking “to bug Bayern a bit”
Seemingly unbeatable FC Bayern Munich had been proved not be as Bayer 04 Leverkusen defeated them last week with 2-1 giving Heynckes´ team the first loss in Bundesliga this season. Now they have to travel to Hamburg and face HSV on Saturday´s night match. HSV coach Thorsten Fink is looking “to bug Bayern a bit” and hopes to continue with the recently good results of his team.
FC Bayern despite losing the first match are still a comfortable first in chart leading Schalke with four points, Frankfurt with five and Dortmund with nine. On foreign grounds FC Bayern Munich are still to receive a goal against at this point of the season.
Schalke in Hoffenheim, duel of the promoted
FC Schalke 04 will meet TSG 1899 Hoffenheim on Saturday. The two teams had been going total opposite directions over the last couple of matchdays. Schalke won three in a row, one of them the prestigious match against Nemesis Dortmund and in Champions League beat Arsenal in London while Hoffenheim have not won in four games and are only two points better than last positioned Greuther Fuerth.
A duel of the two recently promoted teams Fuerth and Eintracht Frankfurt will take place on Friday night. The development of the two teams in league one could not be more different. Frankfurt have more points (19) than the other two promoted ones Duesseldorf (ten) and Fuerth (six) combined. Eintracht are third in chart and have lost only one match this campaign.
Borussia Moenchengladbach will try to make up for the painful defeat in DFB Pokal on Wednesday against Fortuna Duesseldorf and win against SC Freiburg. Hanover 96 will need the three points against FC Augsburg in order to stay in touch with the upper ranks in chart. 1. FC Nuremberg had a quiet week as they had been already kicked out of cup in first round and will play against VFL Wolfsburg now. The coach temporarily in charge Lorenz-Guenther Koestner led the team to two victories in cup and league since Felix Magath left.
Bayer on Sunday
Bayer 04 Leverkusen are unbeaten over the last ten games and on fifth position in chart. Now they will face Fortuna Duesseldorf on Sunday afternoon. The “Factory squad” have not won a match against Duesseldorf for 26 years, although you might have to add that Fortuna played the major part of that time in different leagues than Bayern. Anyway Leverkusen had been unable to win the last six league matches against Duesseldorf and are looking to end this series.
The other match on Sunday late afternoon will be between Werder Bremen and Mainz 05. Werder had a quiet week as they had been kicked out of DFB Pokal already. Mainz defeated Erzgebirge Aue with 2-0 to proceed to the round of 16. In Bundesliga Mainz have gained ten out of the possible twelve points recently climbing up in chart to position six. Bremen with eleven points in total are sitting in the middle of nowhere on position eleven.
