Lahm got lucky there but full backs who make runs like that are invaluable. Got the luck he deserved.
Luca Toni missed some cracking chances during that game but popped up at the end for the winner and my bet won. Thought Bayern were worth the win. They kept pressing on at 1-1 and always looked like creating chances. Klose was quite pedestrian for them.
Big win though.
Bundesliga resumes tonight with a bang - Bayern at Hamburg. Should be a cracking game. It’s live on Setanta.
Weekend’s fixtures are:
31 Jan, 14:30 Hanover v Schalke
31 Jan, 14:30 Koln v Wolfsburg
31 Jan, 14:30 Dortmund v Leverkusen
31 Jan, 14:30 Berlin v Frankfurt
31 Jan, 14:30 Hoffenheim v Cottbus
31 Jan, 14:30 Stuttgart v M’gladbach
1 Feb, 16:00 Bochum v Karlsruhe
1 Feb, 16:00 Bremen v Bielefeld
My tips are in bold. No bold = draw.
Rocko what is after happening Hoffenheim…I see they have gone from first to fifth or sixth
They’re just not winning Puke. Coach is saying that the fame went to their head and they’ve started believing the hype and going to discos and shit like that. They were punching above their weight but they are a decent team so they’ve fallen away a bit suddenly.
Don’t think the goals have really dried up it’s just that you can’t keep winning 4-2 every week. They had a couple of boring draws there recently but that was against decent teams. They’d a belting 3-3 game against Stuttgart the other week. Just a good while since they’ve won now.
[media=youtube]WuyUG_gV5ZA
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog/2009/apr/06/wolfsburg-bayern-munich-bundesliga
Grafite’s signature goal takes Wolfsburg’s winning sequence to eight
Grafite’s goal for Wolfsburg heaped humiliation on Bayern Munich and may be the best ever in the Bundesliga
Fritz von Thurn und Taxis: a German mini cab firm? No, he is the country’s poshest, most excitable TV commentator – his full name, if you must know, is Friedrich Leonhard Ignatius Josef Maria Lamoral Balthasar Prinz von Thurn und Taxis. Good old Fritz’s speciality is a cheeky dose of carefully crafted homoeroticism – Bixente Lizarazu was always “der geschmeidige Franzose”, “the lissom, supple Frenchman” – and he is not half bad at conveying the game’s full range of highs and lows, either. On Saturday, Von Thurn und Taxis went as far as any commentator can go without falling off his seat. “This,” he announced breathlessly, “is definitely the goal of the season, if not the best goal I have ever seen since the Bundesliga started in 1963.”
He would have been only 13 at the time and there wasn’t much TV coverage back then, but he said it as if he really meant it. And perhaps Wolfsburg’s Volkswagen Arena did really witness the best goal since modern German football began. It’s certainly hard to think of a better individual one, with the possible exception of Jay-Jay Okocha’s effort for Eintracht Frankfurt in 1993.*
The miracle occurred at 16.05 when Wolfsburg’s Grafite, the powerful Brazilian striker who made his living selling bin bags eight years ago, first turned Bayern’s poor Andreas Ottl inside-out like a prawn tempura roll. Then he bypassed Christian Lell, stepped away from the goalkeeper, Michael Rensing, and left Breno and Philipp Lahm in his wake. The pice de rsistance was a reverse back-heel with so little power it was almost on standby, timed to agonisingly slow perfection. “I was blowing it in from the back,” claimed Wolfsburg’s Italian defender Andrea Barzagli, possibly with Thurn und Taxis in mind. In any case, Breno and Ottl both managed to miss the ball and were in the end made to look like two players from International Soccer who accidentally stumbled on to the pitch for a Fifa09 match.
Grafite’s second and Wolfsburg’s fifth of the afternoon, a combination of sublime beauty and comedy of which Sarah Silverman could only dream, sealed the worst defeat for Bayern in seven years. “If Wolfsburg go on to win the league, this will be the moment that signalled their arrival,” wrote Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung about the penultimate act of humiliation. Felix Magath, Wolfsburg’s manager, still had time to replace his goalkeeper in the final minute, a highly unusual move taken as a deliberate insult by Bayern’s captain, Mark van Bommel. It had nothing do with annoying Bayern, Magath claimed: “Andr Lenz [the No2] has a tough time competing with Diego Benaglio,” he said. “I knew he would appreciate the bonus payment.”
Magath has reportedly negotiated a nice bonus payment with himself as both Wolfsburg’s sporting director and CEO, in case he should win the championship. It’s not inconceivable that all three will be quids-in at the end of this truly remarkable campaign. Eight wins on the trot have taken the 55-year-old’s supremely confident side all the way to the top of the table, with only eight games to go. “We will keep our feet on the ground and try to defend our current position if possible,” said Grafite with clever ambiguity. He has scored 20 goals in 17 games, a strike-rate that not even the ridiculously proficient Gerd Mller could better in his heyday.
After Wolves’ sensational 5–1 win, the German media was predictably raving about “the magic triangle” of Grafite, his Bosnian partner Edin Dzeko and the former Bayern midfielder Zvjezdan Misimovic, who is currently the sharpest passer in central Europe. Grafite, however, made a valid case for the left-sided midfielder Christian Gentner to be included in a “magic square”. Magath singled out the holding midfielder Josu, who completely dominated Van Bommel and Ze Roberto.
“Today, the better players won, not the better tactics”, Magath said. It’s a verdict that will especially aggrieve the Bayern board because it does suggest that its team can’t even rely on the class of individuals any more. Collectively, there has been very little progress since the manager Jrgen Klinsmann promised a brave new world. Against Wolfsburg they played well enough in the first half (1–1), only to take leave of all sense and shape after the break. The home side needed only four smartly executed counter-attacks to inflict a minor catastrophe on their guests.
“It was a special day for us and I think for Bayern, too”, Magath said, with a glint in his eye. He insisted that fifth place is still their official aim – “this season has already seen quite a few league leaders who have slipped soon after” – and conceded that the visitors had been the better side in the first half. At the same time, he was careful to remind everyone that he had been sitting in Klinsmann’s chair not long ago. He was fired in 2007 after he had fallen out with most of the players and the board. “I understand how hard it is when you’re thinking about the Champions League,” he said. The inference was that Bayern had made a serious mistake letting him go, of course.
While the Bayern players refused interviews – “the silence of the lambs”, wrote SPOX.com – and got a private dressing down by both the general manager, Uli Hoeness, and chairman, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, a very pale Klinsmann was left to explain yet another un-Bayern-like defeat. He spoke about hurting and bouncing back. Again.
In Sunday’s press conference, he went on the offensive, however. “It’s time for the players to take on responsibility,” he said angrily. “This was a problem of mentality, of not wanting it enough. And not for the first time.” The league form has been so inconsistent that even making it to the Champions League again can no longer be guaranteed. “Every player needs to realise that the future of the club is at stake here. Those who don’t understand will be dealt with, regardless of their contractual situation,” he added.
Sadly, Lukas Podolski cannot be fired any more, as he’s already been sold back to Cologne. But Klinsmann might still have to drop him, Miroslav Klose’s injury notwithstanding, to underline that complacency will no longer be tolerated. On Saturday, the man with the biggest inflated sense of his own talent since Babylon Zoo’s Jas ‘We’ll be bigger than the Beatles’ Mann couldn’t have been more anonymous with a brown-paper bag over his head. Barcelona will not exactly be quaking in their boots on Wednesday.
Wolfsburg, meanwhile, will have to get used to their status as serious title challengers. One thing Magath’s teams always do is finish strongly, thanks to the sort of fitness regime you only ever see in old war movies today. The man with dictator-wide powers and considerable backing from Volkswagen at his disposal even had his own mini-mountain built, an exercise course which Magath describes as “brutally steep, brutally good” . Apart from the physical benefits, there’s probably a useful psychological effect, too. Climbing all the way to the top seems to come easy to this team.
Results: Bielefeld 0–2 Schalke, Wolfsburg 5–1 Bayern, Hamburg 1–0 Hoffenheim, Bochum 1–2 Stuttgart, Hertha 1–3 Dortmund, Frankfurt 2–1 Cottbus, Karlsruhe 0–0 Galdbach, Bremen 4–1 Hannover, Cologne 0–2 Leverkusen.
- [media=youtube]WsjDv7e31wA
Bayern Munich lost 1-0 at home to Schalke today and Ribery was sent off. They’ll be struggling to win the league at this rate.
I’d be surprised if Bayern won it from here.
Wolfsburg are away at Cottbus today and can go 6 clear of them (and 5 clear of Hertha). 8/13 by the way, pretty good price for first away at second bottom, though it’s Wolfsburg’s home form that has been ridiculous. Don’t know what Bayern will do if they do lose the league to Wolfsburg. The obvious solution would be to take their manager but Magath manages them and they’ve already tried him and got rid.
[quote=“therock67”]I’d be surprised if Bayern won it from here.
Wolfsburg are away at Cottbus today and can go 6 clear of them (and 5 clear of Hertha). 8/13 by the way, pretty good price for first away at second bottom, though it’s Wolfsburg’s home form that has been ridiculous. Don’t know what Bayern will do if they do lose the league to Wolfsburg. The obvious solution would be to take their manager but Magath manages them and they’ve already tried him and got rid.[/quote]
I know I could google it but I don’t know much about Wolfsburg’s squad. Who are their main men?
They don’t really have any.
Today they’ll start with:
Benaglio - Pekarik, Simunek, Barzagli, M. Schfer - Josu - Riether, Gentner - Misimovic - Grafite, Dzeko
because that’s who has started for the last 5 games in a row.
Their main players have been the keeper and the two strikers.
Grafite has over 20 goals, Dzeko isn’t far behind and your man Misimovic looks a good player. But they’re not really household names.
Barzagli was linked with Celtic in the summer of 2007 - think he was in the Italian squad for WC 2006. Yer man’s the Swiss 'keeper, isn’t he? Don’t know anything about the strikers really - must have an oul read about them.
Yeah he’s Swiss anyway.
Think a Moenchengladbach/Wolfsburg double is the way forward today.
wolfsburg fooked up big style today
Yeah that was a bit surprising alright. Big chance for them today to pull clear but made a mess of it.
I see Jurgen Klinsmann got the road from Bayern.
Yeah not really a surprise that they got rid of him but the timing is a bit surprising, you’d think they’d let him try and win the league. Jupp Heynckes has taken over as caretaker. He’s mates with Uli Hoeness.
Was just reading bild.de there, they’re going to town on the story.
What do you make of the bould Jurgen rocko? Bit of a spoofer?
Yeah don’t like him. He’s full of talk and ideas about methods and diets and stuff like that but he certainly hasn’t improved on Hitzfeld’s team from last year and didn’t really seem to know how to change things around once the initial enthusiasm wore off. He didn’t even get guys like Podolski playing for him despite invigorating the players when he was in charge of the national team.
They won the league by 10 points last year, they weren’t completely convincing and they were a tad boring sometimes but they won’t get anything like the same points total this season.
Is it safe to say Low was the brains behind that team then? I see Bayern have gone for Arsene, some fooking hope I’d say.
[quote=“therock67”]He’s mates with Uli Hoeness.
.[/quote]
It’s not really relevant to the conversation but I love this story about Uli and Alan McInally:
Alan McInally has many amusing anecdotes from his time at Bayern Munich (1989-92), most of which pertain to group-outings in the town’s infamous P1 night-club and are not quite fit to print. But one remarkable memory that can be shared tells of a unique obsession of Uli Hoeness, the general manager. Hoeness would approach the Scottish striker before Bundesliga matches and offer him a couple of hundred Deutschmarks, cash - if he scored goals with headers. McInally was very surprised by that illicit proposal but accepted Hoeness’s explanation that he simply liked headed goals very much.