Last season Bayer Leverkusen and Schalke profited from a lack of European football. With that pair struggling and Gladbach and Werder Bremen focused and flying, are European campaigns hindering some German clubs?
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/G. Kirchner
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If it seems counterintuitive, it's because it probably is. But there's an argument to be made that, for all but the Bundesliga's two biggest beasts, achieving your aims can quickly become a millstone around your neck.
Six titles in a row with an average winning margin of 17 points demonstrates the chasm between Bayern Munich and second place. Despite slipping to fourth in a tumultuous 2017-18, Borussia Dortmund's resources and squad mean the gap between them and the other 16 clubs is almost as vast, as evidenced by their barnstorming start to this season.
Currently sandwiched between the big two in the table are surprise packages Borussia Mönchengladbach and Werder Bremen. Gladbach's 4-0 demolition of Mainz on Sunday ensured their best league start for over 30 years while Bremen's clinical 2-0 victory over Schalke the day before put them 11 points clear of their opponents, who finished last season as runners-up.
With almost a quarter of the season gone, three of the four clubs clubs that finished immediately outside the European spots last term (Gladbach, Hertha Berlin and Werder Bremen) are, along with Dortmund, the league's overachievers.
Time between games reaps rewards
As with Leverkusen and Schalke, who looked vibrant and well-drilled respectively last term, the fruits of rest and increased preparation time are paying dividends.
Extra time on the training pitch certainly paid off for Hoffenheim last season as Julian Naglesmann's side improved sharply after exiting the Europa League at the group stage. They took 23 points from the last 30 to pip Leverkusen and a Leipzig side who went much deeper in Europe to a Champions League spot on the last day.
The squads of the sides underneath the top tier of the Bundesliga naturally have a smaller pool of players of the quality required for consistency at home and abroad and, at the minute, that's showing. As the season goes on, fatigue is also likely to be an issue, particularly for Leipzig, whose Europa League qualification campaign has seen them play six more games than the league's other sides. They've also used the least number of players in the division (19).
Schalke have struggled to replicate last season's formImage: picture-alliance/dpa/G. Kirchner
While fighting on two or three fronts hasn't always proved impossible — Leverkusen had qualified for five out of six Champions Leagues before last term — the Bundesliga has had a wider variety of clubs in European competition than most of the continent's other top leagues in recent seasons.
In a league where title races looked to have become a thing of the past, this is often regarded as a positive. A lack of sides able to demonstrate consistency over a season leaves the majority of matches unpredictable and offers the chance of European adventures to a greater number of fans — with Augsburg, Mainz and Freiburg among the surprise recent beneficiaries of this.
Bremen, Gladbach and Hertha are the latest sides to get ideas above their supposed station and few associated with those clubs are likely to be thinking much beyond next weekend, let alone considering next season.
Bundesliga matchday 8 in pictures
There were crushing wins for Eintracht Frankfurt, Borussia Mönchengladbach and Borussia Dortmund, while Bayern Munich got back to winning ways in Wolfsburg. Werder Bremen also impressed while RB Leipzig were frustrated.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/M. Becker
Borussia Mönchengladbach 4 - 0 Mainz
Dieter Hecking's men moved up to second with a clinical dismantling of Mainz. Jonas Hofmann finished off Thorgan Hazard passes either side of the break then completed his hat-trick after Hazard scored himself. That's 10 points from the last 12 for The Foals. Things couldn't be much more different for Mainz. The Zerofivers have two points from their last five and haven't scored in 450 minutes.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/M. Becker
Stuttgart 0-4 Borussia Dortmund
Borussia Dortmund are the only remaining unbeaten team in the Bundesliga, and that never looked like changing away at struggling Stuttgart under new coach Markus Weinzierl. Jadon Sancho (pictured) gave the visitors the lead inside three minutes before Marco Reus and Paco Alcacer made it 3-0 after just 25 minutes. Max Philipp added a fourth as full-time approached to cap off a comfortable day.
Image: Imago/kolbert-press
Hertha Berlin 1 - 1 Freiburg
The hosts started strongly on Sunday, with Ondrej Duda's sixth of the season (pictured) completing a great move to give them an early lead. Pal Dardai's side were pegged back by a deflected Robin Koch strike just before the break. Freiburg had their chances but Hertha almost won it late on when Dardai's son Palko was fouled in the box, only for the penalty decision to be overturned by VAR.
Image: imago/Camera 4/T. Wiedensohler
Wolfsburg 1-3 Bayern Munich
Robert Lewandowski (second from left) scored twice as Bayern Munich ended a run of four games without a win. The champions were reduced to ten men in the second half when Arjen Robben was shown a second yellow card (the first for diving) before Wolfsburg pulled one back through Wout Weghorst. But James Rodriguez restored the two-goal cushion to relieve the pressure on coach Niko Kovac.
Image: Reuters/F. Bimmer
Schalke 0-2 Werder Bremen
Werder Bremen inflicted a sixth defeat in eight games on Schalke and moved up to second in the Bundesliga, behind Borussia Dortmund. Maximilian Eggestein struck twice for the Green and Whites either side of half-time against a wasteful Schalke side. Mark Uth saw a header cannon back off the crossbar in the closing minutes, but it was the closest the Royal Blues came.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/G. Kirchner
Nuremberg 1-3 Hoffenheim
Hoffenheim came from behind to inflict a first home defeat of the season on newly-promoted Nuremberg. Captain Hanno Behrens gave the "Club" the lead from the spot in an even first half but a quick-fire brace from English teenager Reiss Nelson (number 9, pictured) turned the game in the visitors' favor. Adam Szalai made it three for Julian Nagelsmann's side who moved up to eighth.
Image: Getty Images/Bongarts/A. Pretty
Bayer Leverkusen 2-2 Hannover
Bayer Leverkusen left it late to come from behind for the second time in the match and rescue a point at home to struggling Hannover. Lars Bender cancelled out Florent Muslija's opener before the break but Felipe Martins restored the visitors' lead in the second half. The home fans had to wait until the 94th minute for Karim Bellerabi's equalizer but there were still boos at full-time.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/R. Vennenbernd
Augsburg 0-0 RB Leipzig
In a match characterized by fouls and regular interruptions, both Augsburg and RB Leipzig settled for a point. The visitors thought they should have had a penalty when Jeffrey Gouweleeuw brought down Timo Werner in the box but the video assistant referee decided - four minutes later - that it wasn't a foul. RB captain Willi Orban came close in stoppage time but the match ended goalless.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/S. Puchner
Eintracht Frankfurt 7-1 Fortuna Düsseldorf
Luka Jovic was the star of the show for Eintracht Frankfurt, who ruthlessly disposed of Fortuna Düsseldorf to move above Bayern into sixth in the Bundesliga. But this game was all about Luka Jovic, who scored five goals in a devastating attacking display. Jovic becomes the Bundesliga's top scorer with a total of seven, and the first Frankfurt player to ever score five goals in a Bundesliga game.
Image: Getty Images/Bongarts/A. Grimm
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But for those with loftier expectations, for Leverkusen and Schalke in particular, the current state of the table poses some tricky questions. The gap to fourth now stands at eight and 11 points respectively, and with several of the teams above them having four less fixtures and two less cross-continent journeys to fulfill between now and the winter break, Domenico Tedesco and Heiko Herrlich don't have as much time to find solutions as they once did.
