Unnecessary defeat in the village

The Werkself suffered a completely unnecessary defeat yesterday at the village in Sinsheim. It is and will remain the same: the chance evaluation is simply underground. It is clearly not due to the defence, which is still among the top 5 in the league in terms of the number of goals conceded. But twenty goals less than the netting competition is a clear sign.

And that's how it was yesterday. Instead of going into half-time with a comfortable lead, the score was only 1-1 after 45 minutes, but even the second half still offered enough opportunities to take the three-goal trio home. So there is then only head shaking when you get a defeat. At some point the knot bursts, that is an old football wisdom. Only at some point it can be too late.

Compulsory victories achieved

With the away win in Paderborn and the home win against Fortuna Düsseldorf, the Werkself started - as expected - with six points into the second half. But both threesomes were clear must-haves in order not to miss the way to the international places.

Shortly before the end of January, the transfer carousel turns again, because as always, one or the other who does not have enough time to play wants to leave the club. Interestingly enough, our defense is always scolded. But a look at the table shows that the Bavarian has the second-best defence in the league with only 22 goals against. That we are not doing enough in the front could be seen clearly yesterday. It's not for nothing that other top clubs have sometimes scored twenty goals more in the current season. So the motto must rather be to improve the exploitation of chances. Is that also a plea for a new striker? Rather no, because I think we have a good line-up at the front on every side.

Merry X-MAS and a Happy New Year

Bad week ends well

Thank goodness the Werkself made a somewhat conciliatory farewell to the 2019 football year with a late goal in Mainz.

The home defeat against Hertha left the team visibly knocked out. The longer the game is over, the more I come to the conclusion that we, the 12th man, are clearly partly to blame for the defeat. I'm not one of those people who whistle at their own team in the stadium and bash certain players. But somehow, in the middle of the week, it all came tumbling down on many of us.

Now let's celebrate the reconciliatory end of the year with the victory in Mainz and attack together again as a family in mid-January. For our sport, for our team.

It still hurts 24 hours later

Even 24 hours after the absolutely catastrophic performance of our team in Cologne it still hurts. Maybe there's some good news: This was by far the worst game of the season, it can't get any worse.

Absolutely lacking self-confidence characterized our boys from the beginning. A completely unnecessary (justified) swallow card from Havertz is the proof of all things. Unfortunate first yellow for Dragovic (it wasn't a foul from him), but it wasn't that. Bailey is replaced and loses the first ten duels and can't get past his opponent and then. Well, everyone has seen it, you don't have to comment on that.

The last week of Advent could have been so quiet, but after the defeat in Cologne it burns again, not the first time this year. But we have also all learned that the fire will go out at some point. But hopefully it will go fast and will not turn into an Easter fire.

There are defeats that don't hurt

Actually, it was already clear to everyone involved yesterday before the match against Juventus that our boys will continue to play in the Europa League in February. You couldn't realistically expect Atletico to give in to Moscow, and they did. We blew our progress with the home defeat against Moscow right at the beginning.

In this respect, the defeat against Turin doesn't hurt at all, quite the opposite. Nobody got hurt and nobody got an unnecessary card, that was the most important thing before the last three championship games against Cologne, Hertha and Mainz.

Monday's draw is in the Europa League and there are a lot of attractive travel destinations, but of course also some unattractive ones. Let the luck of the draw be on our side, even if the home game takes place on Weiberfastnacht.

There you go

Past after the victories in Bavaria and now at home against Schalke the fairy tale that Bayer can win no Saturday evening game at 18.30 o'clock. Gone are the myths that the Werkself can't win a match against a team that stands in front of us.

Again we could see yesterday that the standard situations of the Werkself have improved significantly again this season. What was seen as a shortcoming last year now leads to a goal in almost every game. It doesn't matter whether Demirbay or Amiri or Havertz shoot the corners. Traffic in front of the goal leads to an own goal or a goalkeeper error.

Actually the game against Schalke was a classic 1:1 game for me for a long time. The aggressive but always fair play of the Werkself paid off. Consistent replay is one of the keys to success.

That's the way it has to go when we play the last three days of the first half against the last player in the table before, third and fourth last. We now have 25 points, 60 is needed to move into international business. With the three coming opponents, the 30 must be at least halfway through the series, then we're still on course. The season will always be decided at the end of the season anyway and not in December.