Bundesliga’s Back

The Bundesliga was back with a bang this weekend after its annual hibernation period as there was the regular serving of goals, upsets and a large portion of poor finishing, mostly from the laughable Luca Toni. His Bayern Munich side remain annoyingly arrogant about retaining their title this season, despite falling to a narrow defeat at the hands of Hamburg, who temporarily topped the table on Friday night before being deposed by 'Autumn Champions' or 'Herbstmeister' Hoffenheim a day later.

Munich goalkeeper Michael Rensing was at fault for the visitors when he could only parry a tame long-range effort up in the air for Mladen Petric to head home the only goal of the game just before the break. Bayern then squandered a hatful of chances in the second half but Toni provided the pick of the bunch with around a quarter of the contest remaining. When a Miroslav Klose cross found him unmarked within kissing distance of the far post he was guilty of a quite monstrous miss when it seemed easier to allow his greasy, Tuncay-esque top-crop to cover his eyes and still score. He had already humiliated himself by marking a disallowed goal with his famous 'ringing in the ears' celebration, which had led to Hamburg stopper Frank Rost mocking him mercilessly by mimicking his trademark routine and remarking afterwards that perhaps it was all that ringing that had prevented him from hearing the referee's whistle. That result dropped the Bavarians to fourth place and leaves them a lot of work to do in the coming months to keep hold of their coveted shield.

Current 'Spitzenreiter' (league leaders) Hoffenheim found the going a little easier as they cruised to a 2-0 home win over Energie Cottbus. Goals from Demba Ba and new-boy Boubacar Sanogo, signed from Werder Bremen during the transfer window, allowed them to enjoy their first outing in their new 30,000 all-seater stadium without injured 'Torschützenkönig' (league's leading scorer) Vedad Ibisevic, who is, devastatingly for his team-mates, out for the season after damaging knee ligaments in a friendly last month. This result was also achieved without the injured Chinedu Obasi and Carlos Eduardo, who was banned after lashing out wildly with a fist at Ivica Olic in a friendly against Hamburg during the winter break. The new boys and table-toppers promise to be a force to be reckoned with once they have a fully-equipped squad at their disposal.

Heading the chasing pack is, somewhat surprisingly, Hertha Berlin. They recorded a 2-1 victory over Eintracht Frankfurt at the Olympiastadion on Saturday, thanks largely to the efforts of their rejuvenated talisman Marko Pantelic. Having been linked with a move away from the capital throughout the winterval, the number 9 netted a brace, the second a driven, well-placed long-range attempt that sealed the points. He also won a penalty that Brazilian midfielder Cicero, having taken over spot-kick duties from the Serbian earlier in the season after a well-publicised Pantelic miss had first caused speculation to arise regarding his future, contrived to miss woefully. Pantelic made a double dedication of his goals, firstly to his watching mother by outlining a big heart with his fingers and, secondly, to his pregnant wife by tucking the ball under his shirt in imitation of his expectant partner. Hertha now lie in second position and will hope that their centre forward can continue to keep all parties content from now until the campaign's culmination.

With the 3 H's (Hoffenheim, Hertha and Hamburg) setting a swift pace at the summit, Werder Bremen could have hoped for a better result than that which they achieved against Arminia Bielefeld at the Weserstadion on Sunday. Without suspended South-American duo Claudio Pizarro and Diego they relied on the strike-power of Hugo Almeida and although the Portuguese managed to fire home a free-kick to level the scores on the stroke of half-time after Thorben Marx had given the guests an early lead, the second half belonged to Bielefeld and 'King' Artur Wichniarek, whose 11th goal of the season (Bielefeld's 17th in total) proved enough to take the points and lift his side out of the relegation zone. Werder remain stranded in the bottom half, 12 points off the pace and with a mountain to climb in order to clinch a crucial Champions League spot.

6th took on 5th in Dortmund on Saturday as Borussia Dortmund and Bayer Leverkusen's contest ended in stalemate. Alexander Frei put the hosts in front in the first period but Patrick Helmes equalised in the second to ensure Leverkusen remain above their rivals in the standings. With Ibisevic now out of the running for the Golden Boot this season, young German international Helmes, scorer of that farcical goal against England in November, may not be a bad bet to come out on top. However, he will almost certainly have to contend with Wolfsburg's Brazilian striker Grafite, 29, whose equaliser for the Wolves in Köln at the weekend, after a Sergiu Radu strike had put the home side ahead, took his tally to 15 and continued his rehabilitation from a serious neck injury sustained at the back end of the first half of the campaign that has seen him return to action looking hungry in more ways than one, having noticeably dropped several kilos over the holidays.

Another victim of an upset on matchday 18 was Schalke 04, who lost 1-0 away at Hannover 96 after dominating proceedings from start to finish. Even before Sergio Pinto's second goal of the season in the 7th minute, Schalke had looked threatening and controlled possession comfortably. The away side carved out so many chances it seemed a matter of time before their slim deficit was cancelled out. However, if Luca Toni's miss had seemed unthinkable, the opportunity wasted by Gerald Asamoah late on here simply went against all logic and patterns of human behaviour. In an identical situation to that faced by the Bayern bungler one day previously, the diminutive Ghanian, who is surely light years past his best now at 30, was presented with a header from even closer range, with the ball floated over even more delicately, and the chance presented even more invitingly, that it seemed impossible for an educated adult to miss the target. But somehow he did just that, and as other occasions opened and closed, Schalke faced up to the prospect of sitting in mid-table this morning, a long way from mounting any sort of title challenge and perhaps soon to be out of the running for Champions League football for yet another year.

Borussia Mönchengladbach stayed at the foot of the table despite the presence of a whole host of January signings made by veteran trainer Hans Meier, the oldest coach in the Bundesliga at 66, including Paul Stalteri, formerly of Tottenham Hotspur. Second-half goals, in the form of a Roel Brouwers own goal and a Mario Gomez tap-in, gave Stuttgart a deserved 3 points which left them in a much-improved 7th spot thanks to the arrival of new trainer Markus Babbel.

The other match on Sunday was played out between Vfl Bochum and Karlsruhe SC in a titanic clash in the Bundesliga basement. Christian Fuchs and new signing from Dortmund Diego Klimowicz secured a 2-0 win that allowed the hosts to leapfrog their opponents into the relative safety of 15th place, a solitary point from trouble. But all talk preceeding the game was of a certain Bochum player and his wife. An unnamed member of the Bochum playing staff was put on the transfer list recently after his wife's shocking revelation that they had fornicated on the Rewirpower Stadion pitch, leading to no small amount of embarassment for Bochum club officials.

Their response to said embarassment, though, was quite extraordinary, not to mention absolutely brilliant. The shield put up at the entrance to the ground was indeed daring, and I for one applaud them. Depicted were two couples partaking in acts of a sexual nature, "www." on one side and either ".com" or ".de" the other, with a large ring round them and line running through the ring, declaring that people will not be permitted to take up such positions on their football field. '.de' means a German website and the position with the woman on top is apparently proven to be the most popular in Germany).

On another note, Michael Ballack was awarded the prize for 'Tor des Jahres' or Goal of the Year 2008 for his stunning set-piece effort against Austria during Euro 2008. Thoroughly deserved I thought.

Oh, and Bayern now have Landon Donovan on their 'roster'. Klinsmann's obviously been doing his homework while living in the US. What a joker. That name reeks of disappointment.