2022-23 German Bundesliga Discussion Thread

[Foye]

Love Köln Brilliant football today

When Selke scores the other team should instantly admit defeat haha

[Foye]

Also, respect to Bremen.
Showing up with 25k fans for a relatively meaningless away game in Berlin. Hats off.

[Foye]

A day after the Bayern victory, Mainz U19 squad becomes German champions in front of 15.000 fans beating Borussia Dortmund 4-2 in extra time.

What an amazing weekend for the club.

[Baphomet]

A day after the Bayern victory, Mainz U19 squad becomes German champions in front of 15.000 fans beating Borussia Dortmund 4-2 in extra time.

What an amazing weekend for the club.

Big ups to Mainz. Here's hoping you can get back into European competition and continue to push on from there.

[Foye]

A day after the Bayern victory, Mainz U19 squad becomes German champions in front of 15.000 fans beating Borussia Dortmund 4-2 in extra time.

What an amazing weekend for the club.

Big ups to Mainz. Here's hoping you can get back into European competition and continue to push on from there.

Thanks. At the minimum we will see the U19 squad in the Youth League next year.

Despite the good season it will be tough to get into Europe. 7th spot currently. We have an away game in Wolfsburg next who are sitting right behind us in 8th only like 2 points behind. Ahead of us at 6th (+2 points) Leverkusen who are 13 games unbeaten and in even better form than we are.
7th might not even be enough to qualify for Europe if the Cup winner is not already qualified through the league.

I am not a big supporter of the Conference League. For a relatively small club like Mainz with a low budget and not a huge fanbase…we are more likely to get in relegation trouble in the Bundesliga than able to develop. And won‘t profit financially either. Not really worth the pain.

I‘d take EL. That will help attract some talented players and we might resign some players that we otherwise could not resign (Barreiro, Stach for example).

[Foye]

Dortmund are rivaling Arsenal for biggest bottlers this year. 1-1 draw at Bochum.

If they have any chance on match day 34, we will crush their hopes with an away win at Signal Iduna Park.

Need to get a ticket for this game.

I can already see Mainz fans shouting „Deutscher Meister ist nur der FSV“ (Only FSV is German champion) in the light of them bottling the Bundesliga championship to Bayern and losing the U19 final against our squad.

[Foye]

Stuttgart won. 16th.

Not looking good for LittleNathan‘s Hertha. 6 points behind Stuttgart.

They almost have to win in Munich tomorrow to stay in striking distance.

Otherwise they are most likely going to be relegated.

Similar situation for Schalke. If they don’t beat Bremen in half an hour…things are getting very difficult for them 4 points behind Stuttgart.

[Foye]

Poor 3-0 loss in Wolfsburg.

We haven’t conceded many goals this year but somehow I still feel like we could have done better with a better CB rotation.

Hanche-Olsen is great.
Bell is reliable but slow.
Fernandes has been okay for large parts of the season but has really regressed in the past 4 weeks. And he is not even a CB to begin with and only playing there because
our other options (Hack, Leitsch) are slapstick defenders.

I hope the management gets it and improves the CB rotation in the offseason.

[Foye]

2-3 loss against Schalke at home.

Seems like we have moved into Sunday league mode.

Horrible game.

[Foye]

Besides the well deserved loss yesterday - literally every game this season I come away more disgusted by the dreadful refereeing in this league.

We are going alone on goal at 2-2 and the ref calls a foul on an absolutely minimal touch by Weiper.

Defender and attacker both grab their shirts (initiated by the attacker) and the ref calls a last second penalty on VAR review despite the fact that neither of the players had a chance to get to the ball and Bülter won the Oscars selling his „foul“.

It is at a point where I am not enjoying the games anymore. I feel like chess is a more physical sport than Bundesliga football at this point.

This is also one of the reasons why the German NT is not competitive in the world anymore.

I am at a point to say get rid of the VAR completely (except for maybe offside).
That way at least you have the chance to have a bit more physical game than chess because the ref will not see everything.

Seriously - VAR has failed. I hate it more with every passing season.

[-Luke-]

I am at a point to say get rid of the VAR completely (except for maybe offside).
That way at least you have the chance to have a bit more physical game than chess because the ref will not see everything.

Seriously - VAR has failed. I hate it more with every passing season.

It has pretty much killed the excitement for watching soccer for me (in the stadium). I know I'm rather a hardliner with this, but if your team scores a goal and you have to wait a minute to be sure it counts... Not for me.

I would continue to use it for (rare) decisions like: was the ball behind the line, but no longer for normal situations in the flow of the game.

[Foye]

I am at a point to say get rid of the VAR completely (except for maybe offside).
That way at least you have the chance to have a bit more physical game than chess because the ref will not see everything.

Seriously - VAR has failed. I hate it more with every passing season.

It has pretty much killed the excitement for watching soccer for me (in the stadium). I know I'm rather a hardliner with this, but if your team scores a goal and you have to wait a minute to be sure it counts... Not for me.

I would continue to use it for (rare) decisions like: was the ball behind the line, but no longer for normal situations in the flow of the game.

But we don't need VAR for determining whether the ball was behind the line. We got goal line technology.

When they implemented VAR, I thought we would see more equality because blatantly false decisions on the field are corrected.
Instead we have a situation where it is completely arbitrary what is reviewed and what not. Biased refereeing continues.
It is good for determining offside. That's it.

Anyway, good to have you here. Seems like Werder is going to stay in the league.

[-Luke-]

I am at a point to say get rid of the VAR completely (except for maybe offside).
That way at least you have the chance to have a bit more physical game than chess because the ref will not see everything.

Seriously - VAR has failed. I hate it more with every passing season.

It has pretty much killed the excitement for watching soccer for me (in the stadium). I know I'm rather a hardliner with this, but if your team scores a goal and you have to wait a minute to be sure it counts... Not for me.

I would continue to use it for (rare) decisions like: was the ball behind the line, but no longer for normal situations in the flow of the game.

But we don't need VAR for determining whether the ball was behind the line. We got goal line technology.

When they implemented VAR, I thought we would see more equality because blatantly false decisions on the field are corrected.
Instead we have a situation where it is completely arbitrary what is reviewed and what not. Biased refereeing continues.
It is good for determining offside. That's it.

Anyway, good to have you here. Seems like Werder is going to stay in the league.

Yes, you're right about goal line technology. I was mixing VAR with general technological tools in my mind.

I agree that it's still pretty arbitrary. Before it was introduced I was sceptical but slightly in favor of VAR. That's because I thought there would be clear rules when it should be used. But it wasn't really the case from the start. I remember a game from the first season with VAR (Werder vs. Hertha). Eggestein fouled a Hertha player in the own half (it was a foul, not a hard one), then Werder passed the ball for like a minute, even lost the ball shortly (new game situation) and scored a goal. It was overruled and no one even knew what happened because the foul was a while ago. Just one situation as an example.

Yeah, Werder's development after relegation was quite good. I had expected worse at the time. Staying in the league is the only goal. We'll see what happens next season if we possibly have to replace one or even two of our strikers.

I hope you guys can maybe get to 6th. Hard game in Frankfurt tomorrow, but maybe they are already thinking about the cup final.

[Foye]

It has pretty much killed the excitement for watching soccer for me (in the stadium). I know I'm rather a hardliner with this, but if your team scores a goal and you have to wait a minute to be sure it counts... Not for me.

I would continue to use it for (rare) decisions like: was the ball behind the line, but no longer for normal situations in the flow of the game.

But we don't need VAR for determining whether the ball was behind the line. We got goal line technology.

When they implemented VAR, I thought we would see more equality because blatantly false decisions on the field are corrected.
Instead we have a situation where it is completely arbitrary what is reviewed and what not. Biased refereeing continues.
It is good for determining offside. That's it.

Anyway, good to have you here. Seems like Werder is going to stay in the league.

Yes, you're right about goal line technology. I was mixing VAR with general technological tools in my mind.

I agree that it's still pretty arbitrary. Before it was introduced I was sceptical but slightly in favor of VAR. That's because I thought there would be clear rules when it should be used. But it wasn't really the case from the start. I remember a game from the first season with VAR (Werder vs. Hertha). Eggestein fouled a Hertha player in the own half (it was a foul, not a hard one), then Werder passed the ball for like a minute, even lost the ball shortly (new game situation) and scored a goal. It was overruled and no one even knew what happened because the foul was a while ago. Just one situation as an example.

Yeah, Werder's development after relegation was quite good. I had expected worse at the time. Staying in the league is the only goal. We'll see what happens next season if we possibly have to replace one or even two of our strikers.

I hope you guys can maybe get to 6th. Hard game in Frankfurt tomorrow, but maybe they are already thinking about the cup final.

I have the feeling the second season after promotion is often more difficult than the first one.

Especially if Werder lose both Füllkrug and Ducksch that would be a huge blow.

Gonna be very difficult to get strikers that can deliver the same amount of offensive production.

We play without Barreiro and Kohr tomorrow.
Widmer is also done for the season.
Our last two games have been quite disappointing. Seems like the team went into early summer vacation after beating Bayern.
Unfortunately, I won’t even be able to go to the game tomorrow due to a wedding. Expecting a loss. Anything more would be surprising. Even though Frankfurt seems to be a mess currently. Glasner and the team are definitely not on the same page anymore.

Actually, I am surprised we played such a decent season. Svensson is really a great coach who keeps everyone accountable. In terms of individual quality our team is probably closer to Werder than it is to Leverkusen, Wolfsburg and Frankfurt whom we are currently fighting with for 6th/7th.

I am not really interested in the Conference league. A club with a small fanbase like Mainz won‘t earn much money there and will most likely suffer injuries to key players…which will end up causing trouble in the league.

Europa League would be much more attractive. I‘d sign up for that one.

But Mainz U19 will play Uefa Youth League next season. I‘ll definitely go to a couple of those games unless they are scheduled at stupid times in the day while I work (as Uefa likes to do).

[Foye]

Hertha is about to be relegated.

It would require a miracle for them to make it.

Incredible how you can blow hundreds of millions in a few years and then get relegated.

[Foye]

Darmstadt 98 back in the league.

Nice short away game for me.

[Foye]

Hertha relegated.

Was about time after years of barely escaping relegation.

Hopefully Schalke is next.

[Foye]

Leipzig leading at Bayern.

Dortmund playing in Augsburg tomorrow.
If they screw this up lmao.

[-Luke-]

It seems Hertha just can't get any competent people in management. I could imagine them going a similar way as Kaiserslautern did years ago (although Kaiserlautern has turned the corner in the meantime and is in a decent position again). Finances don't seem to be looking too good for Hertha either.

My sympathy is limited after all the money they have burned.

[Foye]

4th loss in a row.

Can already congratulate Dortmund to the championship.

We are not competitive at the moment. We are going to lose by at least three goals next week.