When Union won the DFB-Pokal match, Hertha's Ultras visited the trainings ground a day later and threatened the players. I suspect this could get ugly again.Lotka the first to do an interview, that's also a bit telling. And it seems like Hertha's fans persuaded some players to lay down their jerseys.
German Football 21/22 | Gladbach sign Farke
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Listening to Magath's interview I'm convinced he doesn't know Eitschberger's name, despite starting him today. He just keeps referring to him as "the left back".
Unfortunately that's more or less par for the course when one of the bigger clubs flirts with relegation.
No surprise. Union is not only constantly better positioned in the league, this now was their third win over Hertha this season. Total dominance in the city over a club that had that status for decades.
I mean Hertha had been "there for the taking" for a while now. When was their last truly good season? Under Favre?! The funny part is that all of this is happening despite getting in bed with Windhorst and burning through close to €400m.
Lucky goal for Leipzig to make it 2-0. Tedesco is such a ridiculous figure.
What a stunning counter-attack by Leipzig there.
3-0.
3-0.
Before today it looked like a quite open battle from place 5-10 for the EL/ECL. Can we now say that the battle narrowed down to place 6-8 between Hoffenheim, Union and Köln? Freiburg got some distance to 6th now (as Hoffenheim is losing now), while Frankfurt and Mainz lost contact. Or does anyone assume any big changes here?
I think Freiburg is still within the margin of error for fourth place: when it's down to five games and three points there's always the chance for dumb luck to intervene. Even more so considering Leipzig are still in the EL for now.
At least the promotion race in the second division is looking spicy. Hamburg are out for good, but Nürnberg are firmly in now. Schalke have weaseled their way into first place, but in their last five matches they still have to face all four other promotion candidates. The stage is set for an epic meltdown.
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Next weekend Leipzig plays Leverkusen. If Freiburg wins at home against Bochum who is not great on the road they will be max.1 point behind 4th... To early to talk about that race especially as Leverkusen plays Freiburg on the last matchday!
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Points/ppg after falling behind.
It's somewhat interesting how badly Freiburg, Leverkusen are doing (lack of ideas in possession, exacerbated when the opponent can just sit back and defend a lead!?) and how well Hoffenhein, Cologne and Frankfurt are doing. For the latter two I assume it's the physical and emotional nature of their football (as well as Andersson/Modeste as a way to bypass the creative process for Cologne) that lets them turn the tide sometimes, I'm less certain about Hoffenheim. In part their strong come back qualities might be related to the fact that they also fall behind more than anyone in the league (Fürth aside), so they get to turn games others would have just convincingly won?!
Both Hoffenheim and Köln always try to dominate their games, especially Köln also has quite a lot of possession. They might try to bypass the creative process a bit, but the point is, both teams don't have to change their tactics when they are chasing the game.
This is different for teams that have a more reactive approach, that just collapses once you are behind.
The graph is also somewhat misleading as Freiburg and Leverkusen aren't really doing worse than the teams above them, despite those having much longer bars - with the graph emphasizing total points over points per game.
That's why yes, both Hoffenheim is at the top instead of Bayern, and teams like Hertha, Mainz, Wolfsburg, Gladbach are ahead of Leverkusen in the table, simply because they fell behind in more games. A table using the more meaningful ppg as representational key would look much more even, and then drawing inferences to style of play would be less tempting.
I don't think Cologne are purely a route one team, but it helps to have two big lads upfront to brute force things if necessary. And I see Köln's above average possession stat more as a testament to their effective pressing, rather than their desire to dominate teams with the ball. However you are correct that their aggressive pressing also helps them when they are behind.
Nothing to see here, just three Instagram influencers having a cat fight over Mats Hummels.
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Now we know why his performances dropped significantly this season.
This whole affair is fantastic 
To be fair to Hummels he seems to be liking a lot of the memes at his expense on Twitter.
I did not even know that this was a thing - but reading commentaries about that stuff on social media made me laugh...
What is it with this influencers...
What is it with this influencers...
Disgusting stuff. How hard is it to leave a child alone?
The eagerness and vehemence with which Brazzo is routinely both scapegoated by many Bayern fans and relentlessly denigrated by the rest of football Germany is also, sorry to say, in some good parts due to racism.
Unfortunately that's just common practice these days and it just takes one idiot to do this. The only surprising thing perhaps is that they went after Brazzo.
I know - but I can't get myself to just accept the vileness of social media. I don't want to normalize this sort of behaviour.
I just don't understand these fans. How exactly is Brazzo the problem, There isn't as much vitriol directed towards the coach who was on the sidelines and picked the players
What exactly do they expect from Brazzo?
Finally some good news for Schalke: their "fan bond" generated €31.7m, a lot more than the €10m-€15m they were targeting. They apparently won't be able to invest that money into their squad, but it will take a load off their mind, since it's almost exactly the sum that would be due in 2023 from their previously issued bond.
https://www.kicker.de/schalkes-frohe-finanzkunde-sidi-san-schon-eine-kaderoption-898246/artikel
https://www.kicker.de/schalkes-frohe-finanzkunde-sidi-san-schon-eine-kaderoption-898246/artikel
Salihamidzic doesn't come across as particularly knowledgable or competent tobput it lightly and then there's also this geschmäckle that he got his job because of Hoeneß' nepotism and reluctance to give up control over Bayern. Plus Bayern were set up brillantly with Flick and are now in an uncertain position and it's obvious Brazzo was one of the reasons why he left
Anyway, nothing of that justifies abuse like that and as you correctly pointed out, much of this is racism and has nothing to with his job performance or how he got into this position to begin with. Tribalism brings a lot of people's ugliest character traits to the surface.
As for the nepotism thing, most board members or officials at Bayern are former players, from Beckenbauer and Hoeness to Rummenigge and now Salihamidzic and of course, Kahn, who just was appointed CEO like in a royal succession. To complain about nepotism at Bayern is absurd, as it's the principle of club running and quite obviously also a source of success.
As for the Hoeness puppet, is this theory, at this point in time, underlined with facts? For example, it's well known that Brazzo was against Kovac and for Tuchel and wasn't towing Hoeness line.
And why does Brazzo not come across as competent or knowledgeable, exactly? Were his transfers incompetent? Hernandez, Musiala, Sané, Davies, now the Ajax duo? His promoting of Neppe? Ot is it because he speaks with a Yugo accent and limited thesaurus? There's a racist undercurrent at work here, no doubt.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not sure just how great a job Brazzo is doing, the falling out with Flick is not a good look (though he hired him in the first place), there were rumblings behind the scenes, there seems to be a lack of good communication with players, too, in some instances. But do we really know? Why is everyone always ready to unload on Brazzo as if it's the most obvious thing to do? Now that's what has a geschmäckle, honestly.
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I think it's fair to ask how much of a reason the fact that he's foreign born and speaks with an accent is for the ridicule he gets. I asked myself that. But I think on one hand he's been living in Germany since he was a child and the problem with his speech isn't necessarily that his vocabulary or understanding of German might be (too) limited, it's that he's talking nonsense somewhat frequently. The way he came into his job (e.g. reports of Lahm turning down an offer, because of too much meddling from the old guard, before Brazzo took it) also created a unfortunate framing from the very start. And it would be one thing if he was some director in the background, but to a large extend they have made him the public face of the management. Zorc for example doesn't seem to be a natural public speaker either, but he knew that and usually took a back seat in favour of Klopp or Watzke.
e.g.
For me there were 3 areas were Salihamidzic didn't perform well.
1. Recruitment.
Richards, Roca, Sarr or Costa last year were all signings who don't have the quality to play for a team whose goal is to be amongst the top 3 teams in Europe.
The depth of the squad is decreasing year by year since Hassan has been in charge.
2. Contract extensions and signings
He didn't only fail to keep important players like Alaba, Thiago or even Süle, no he left them leave on a free or at below market prices.
Important players like Boateng, Thiago and Martinez Bayern weren't replaced at all.
We always had 4 wingers, now only 3 are left. Letting Boateng and Alaba leave the same year was outright stupid.
On one hand he claims Bayern doesn't have the money for big transfers but then spent 80 millions Euro on Hernandez who even had a severe inquiry at that time.
Letting contract extensions of key players like Lewandowski, Gnabry, Müller run into April when the crucial knock out matches in the CL take place should never have happened either.
3. His spat with Flick
A big part of last year's season was overshadowed by the ongoing, public quarrels between Salihamidzic and Flick. The result was that Bayerns most successful coach and a perfect fit left the club.
So yeah I can completely understand many fans being unhappy with Salihamidzic and his performance.
Of course this never justifies why personal threads against him or his family.
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It's all ok guys.. a couple of death threads against Brazzo and his family were a well measured response after all, since Nagelsmann got 450 (!) via Instagram
He also said that a back three yields more death threats than a back four.
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1. Recruitment at every club has always been a mixed bag, Even at Bayern pre Brazzo we have always had mixed bags with recruitments, we have had the Robbens and the Brenos as well
Bayern is a supposed big club trying to survive on the budget of a mid table club. So we have to make do with many hit and miss low budget signings
2. If Bayern is not willing to shell out big bucks on salary, they will always have top players leave. We lost our captain and best player Ballack to Chelsea and no one blamed Rummenigge for it. Thiago and Alaba claimed they wanted a different experience while Sule never convinced plus Its obvious the coach Naggelsman prefers Upamecano as his RCB. This limits the chances of Sule. He is a German international and wont be content with sharing playtime, he opted for Dortmund on similar salary but guarantees to start more. Should Brazo have overriden JN to enforce Sule starts?
Part of having 3 wingers is to have Musiala a youth grow into 4th one which gives him game time and opportunity to develop, buying a 4th winger effectively shuts out Musiala. In our 2 treble seasons I only remember us having 3 Wingers Robben Ribery Shaqiri. Then Coman Gnabry Perisic.
Hernandez is one of the risks you face in big money transfers. Many top clubs have a big money transfer not living up to hype. I think Hernandez is still our best CB.
Its not like Muller Gnabry and Lewy contract will expire in the summer, we still have another 12months on all of them
Its funny the fans who don't want the "stained money" like other top clubs want to spent money like other top clubs. Yet Brazzo must always get his transfers 10/10. He got us Davies who has turned into one of the best LB in the world, we got Sane
3. I also feel bad that Flick left the club but that's on Kalle as much as its on Brazzo
Currently Brazzo does not even take a stand to the topics - Nagelsmann always has to do it. Kahn only is fully into his "Ahead" project and everything else he talks is just somewhat meaningless - same with Hainer...
The topic about Brazzo B. Munich already has explained. It seems more like he looks at prospects on youtube than that he takes care about the actual team. That Hermann Gerland e.g. left last season (and e.g. Klose did, too, with the mention that Bayern has lost its family atmosphere it used to have) and not because of Nagelsmann is another point.
It is e.g. not that Thiago left - but until May he was totally into staying and Liverpool late jumped into that. This contract extensions should have been in the bag months before that and not the last topic on the list. Same with Alaba and others.
The topic about Brazzo B. Munich already has explained. It seems more like he looks at prospects on youtube than that he takes care about the actual team. That Hermann Gerland e.g. left last season (and e.g. Klose did, too, with the mention that Bayern has lost its family atmosphere it used to have) and not because of Nagelsmann is another point.
It is e.g. not that Thiago left - but until May he was totally into staying and Liverpool late jumped into that. This contract extensions should have been in the bag months before that and not the last topic on the list. Same with Alaba and others.
On one hand Bayern wants to be always in the top 4 in Europe. On the other hand they don't want to compete with the big boys.
Terrible representation of strategic from our board of which Salihamidzic is the guy doing most of the communication.
2006 Bayern wasn't in the top 5. Also I don't remember Ballack leaving on a free transfer.
Since then until Alaba we only lost Kroos, which also was an huge mistake. Since the last CL we lost Thiago, Alaba, Süle and maybe now also Lewandowski and Gnabry.
When I read about Lewandowski's rumored replacements I'm more than worried. One guy plays at Stuttgart!
Nagelsmann absolutely wanted to keep Süle.
Then make a statement that they and contract negotiations will start after the season. Simple.
However, Hassan started the contract talks just when the big knock out matches came up. Look at Haaland. The ongoing speculation isn't helping his form at all. Lewandowski is more experienced but he looks not at his best since these rumors about leaving started
The communication is just sub par.
Living in the Philippines I don't get all information. However, in all the football shows (Doppelpass, Sky90, Reif ist live...) the spat between Flick and Salihamidzic was popular topic for months with Flick becoming more and more unsettled. I don't remember Rummenigge siding with Hassan. He wanted to keep Flick.
If Bayern had kept Flick, replaced Salihamidzic with somebody like Eberl, we would be in a much better shape today.
At least those death threat making psychos know their football.
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Every time I read a little analysis about Walterball I'm a bit amazed that he's doing this with 2nd division players. It's unfortunate he couldn't find the success that would inspire others to try the same.
After Nagelsmann's presser yesterday I also have to wonder how many death threats he gets when the keeper makes a mistake.
I think it's not unfortunate but natural. Walterball relies on exceptional awareness of all players involved in their rotations and a lack of concentration can be much easier punished than against a more traditional setup.
Nonetheless it's beautiful when it works, the human mind just isn't suited to do it for 90 minutes.
the wuf is Wolfsburg doing.
Good day for Dortmund.