With an away win into the international break

I'm so happy for our Brazilian after Paulinho's late goals in Wolfsburg, after he left so much in the last few weeks. Hopefully these goals will help him to break the knot and show his class on the pitch in the coming weeks.
The win gives us hope that we can still get the necessary points for Champions League qualification in the next few weeks. But we can't hope that our rivals will let us down like they did at the weekend. We have to pull it off ourselves.

The next knockout blow

Bayer was eliminated from the Europa League last night with a 0:1 against Atlanta Bergamo, the next knockout for the Werkself. Bayer was well set defensively in the first half and did not allow anything spectacular from the Italians compared to the previous week. Bayer came out of the dressing room with more offensive verve, but again the Werkself should not succeed in scoring a goal. The chances were there, on the contrary, in the injury time it came to the - as they say in ice hockey - Empty Net Goal of the guests. Pure disappointment that our logo is not in the drum today at the draw.

Emptiness after derby defeat

 Even one day after the unnecessary 0:1 against Cologne, I still can't understand the result. It was once again a day of unfortunate events. Frimpong out after a good ten minutes, the next injury to Wirtz twenty minutes later. And the news of the cruciate ligament rupture is shocking news. To make matters worse, Kossonou was the third injured player to go off at half-time. Of course, that leaves you with almost no tactical options in the second half.

To make matters worse, Cologne scored with their second chance, although the Werkself should have been in the lead long ago. And the equaliser was also denied. The press will later say that the team failed to make the most of its chances. Hopefully, the headlines will be more Bayer-friendly again after next Thursday's match against Bergamo.

Chance preserved in Bergamo

It certainly wasn't the Werkself's best away game last night at Atlanta Bergamo. With the 3:2 defeat, progress is definitely possible with next week's home game on Thursday.

It's also nice to see that after the abolition of the away goals rule, the games are less dominated by tactical guidelines. Every team tried to go for goals from the start.

I also don't agree with voices in today's press that Bayer were clearly outclassed and are giving the coach a major headache looking ahead to the second leg. When you score two goals away at the third-placed team in the Italian league, the team doesn't fall apart. Full stop. And the goalkeeper is part of the team and should ideally always be player of the match. I'm sticking to my guns: advancing is absolutely possible and not unrealistic.

But before that happens, we have to play the left side of the Rhine on Sunday and we have to concentrate 100% on that.

Deserved point in Munich

After four games without a win against Bayern, the Werkself got a deserved point at the Allianz Arena yesterday. I'm only annoyed by the headline in today's press that Thomas Müller secured the point for Bayer with his own goal. That is too short-sighted.

Bayern started strongly and you had to fear a repeat of the first leg. At half-time, however, Leverkusen should have led 3:1 in Munich. Good game can only be said about the 90 minutes, or the other way round: After a bad start, Leverkusen stabilised well and deserved a point. That gives us courage for the next games.