No Goals, No Party? Not Quite

Let’s be real – when you walk out of the BayArena after a 0-0 draw against Union Berlin and still feel a little inner fireworks show going off, something unusual must have happened. Either you’ve had one Kölsch too many (no judgment here), or Bayer 04 Leverkusen just qualified for the 2025/26 UEFA Champions League with five games to spare. Spoiler: it’s the second one. Though, for some of us, the first might’ve been true too.

From the first minute, the match looked like a tutorial on "How to keep possession forever" – with Bayer as the teacher and Union Berlin as the poor students who forgot their notebooks. Over 700 passes, nearly 75% possession, 42 crosses. At times, it felt like we were less in a Bundesliga match and more in a passing drill – only with 30,000 fans watching and Union parked like a 90s Fiat Punto in their own penalty box.

And yet: no goal. Schick had chances early, Frimpong sprinted past people like he was playing a different sport, and then came the glorious return of Florian Wirtz – who instantly reminded us why we’ve been counting the minutes until he was back. He came on, the stadium rose as one, and boom – the tempo changed, the creativity returned, the spark was back. He even nearly created the winner. But football can be a cruel game, and this time, the ball stubbornly refused to cross the line.

Still, it wasn’t all doom and gloom. Jonas Hofmann continued his magical unbeaten Bundesliga run in a Bayer shirt – 40 games, zero losses. The man is basically allergic to defeat. If he ever does lose a league game, I’m expecting a minor cosmic event, possibly visible from space.

Coach Xabi Alonso didn’t crack a smile in the post-match press conference – and to be fair, he wasn’t wrong. He said we lacked a bit of energy and sharpness in the final third, and yeah, you could see that. It’s been a long season full of brilliance, and every battery eventually flashes red. The important thing? We’re still picking up points even when we’re not at our best.

Union? Well, they did what Union always do. Parked the bus, added a second one for good measure, and defended like their lives depended on it. Offensively, they were about as threatening as a damp sponge. But you have to give them credit – they executed their game plan perfectly and even had one goal ruled out for offside. Still, if this game ever becomes a Netflix documentary, I promise I won’t be watching.

So, what do we take from all this? A point. A Champions League spot. And the comforting feeling that even when we’re not firing on all cylinders, we’re still clearly better than most. Let’s be honest – I’d rather draw 0-0 against Union than get smacked 3-0 by Augsburg, right?

Next stop: St. Pauli. A trip to the wild north, the Millerntor, a Sunday night under the lights. And hopefully, this time, with more goals in the backpack. Because if we’re gonna play Champions League next season, we might as well start acting like it again. Schick deserves a goal. Wirtz deserves the world. And we fans? We deserve a party.