On days like this

Seven years we waited for this day and after seven years we finally won another away match in Munich. But all the augurs had predicted a clear defeat for the Werkself. But that's football and sometimes it's not the team that wins, which is quoted with 1.13 at Tipco, but the team that wins with 11th place.

That was amazing how the betting quotas in the week after the 6:0 of the Bavarians in Belgrade had shifted in favor of the Bavarians. If there was before the Belgrade game with Heilsbringer Flick still 6 for 1 a Leverkusen victory shrank the odds then to 11:1.

With this victory, we have not let it tear upwards, it all remains close together, the Werkself has long again won a Saturday 18:30 game. All just good news on days like this.

We spend the winter in all competitions

No, it was certainly not a brilliant performance today in the Moscow cold. But what the hell, the Werkself wins 2:0 at Lok Moscow and after the underground start into the Champions League is at least now safely on 3rd place. We spend the winter in all competitions.

Everything left behind

Was it only the bad turf, which all players complained about after the game, the fault that our team did not get beyond a 1:1 against Freiburg despite a two-digit number of top-class chances? Maybe there's some truth to it, but if there is, it's our own fault, because we played at home. Rarely have I seen a game where so many players slipped and got stuck.

Actually, you can hardly blame the Werkself, because our team played well. But it's still not enough to give them a "very good" rating. We would have had to net at least once more. But sometimes luck really isn't on our side. And that's no excuse or phrase.

It would be nice if luck returns on Tuesday in the Champions League game in Moscow. But only with luck you can't survive, we have to shine and win with two goals. Then the Euro League is safe and with a view to wintering in the Champions League there's still something to do.  

Back on the road to the trail

After the defeat against Gladbach a week ago, no one would have thought it possible that the factory self in the Champions League Atletico Madrid fully deserved to beat and deserved to take three points in Wolfsburg.

Especially the match against the Madrilenians showed what is possible with full concentration. And the surprising thing about the Wolfsburg victory is the fact that our team had no corner in the whole game and won anyway. I don't like to remember Hoffenheim home game, where we felt 20:0 corners had and no threesome landed. The same against Gladbach where in the end 12:0 corners for us were on the books. But fair enough I have to state that our corners in the Madrid game were almost all very dangerous, so that the Werkself is obviously on the right track with standards.

It's always good to go into the international break with a win. The next opponent is Freiburg, the surprise team of the current season before the league goes to Munich. Not to forget the match in Moscow this week, when it's all or nothing for a winter in Europe. But now there's a break, after the many English weeks it's also good.

Hard times

There have certainly been better months than this terrible football October. And the start into November didn't go as expected with the well-deserved home defeat against Gladbach.

If you try to answer the question who lost the game, the defense or the attack, then the answer is clear: both. If you don't pay attention twice in the back and score two equally annoying goals against each other and don't net in front despite numerous promising possibilities, then you are empty-handed after 90 minutes - despite again better statistics than the opponent. I think we could have continued playing for hours yesterday and it would not have been possible to equalise. Annoying, because Gladbach certainly didn't deserve to win.

Now again the discussion rages in the social media who is to blame for the bad series. First the coach stands in the fire, then Völler and Rolfes and isolated players. My God, there is no one to blame for the current situation. The team showed in the second half of the season that they are doing well. And only the team can free itself from the misery. Of course you also need luck sometimes. We certainly didn't have that, because our boys didn't get a second ball yesterday, for example, everyone went to the opponent.

Wednesday Atletico will come, certainly not the decisive game in the Champions League, to maybe reach the Euro League after all. A point or better three would help us very, very much.

Not badly played, but nothing fetched

At least in the first sixty minutes of the Champions League away match at Atletico Madrid, the Werkself could not be accused of having learned nothing from the defeat in Frankfurt.  But what I couldn't deny and that's the way it is when you score zero goals: Our highly praised storm did not hit again. You can always get one in Atletico, but to be honest, I haven't seen much of a chance for our team to score.

To those of you who are now making the swan song to the Champions League, all you can say is that it was already clear after the home defeat against Moscow that this year it's all about the Euro League for us. And nothing has changed in the constellation so far. There is still everything in it, especially since we can also win in Moscow with heart and blood with two goals difference.

Now four home games in a row follow, our whole concentration has to be on it: scoring in the Bundesliga and getting ahead in the cup against Paderborn. Then it doesn't matter what the outcome against Atletico will be in the second leg. This will be a game for increasing self-confidence if things go well or for increasing uncertainty if things go badly. I believe in the first one. The season is still long.

A painful evening

Just is different, but if you are already 2:0 behind after 15 minutes, then it will probably be a painful evening. 

Our guys haven't been able to control their opponents for much of the first half. Then it doesn't help if we were the clearly better team in the second half. Six/seven high-carat chances we did not use and then still one caught.

All in all it is too little at the end of the day. We stand in the secured midfield, but that cannot and must not be our claim with this team.