We didn’t see this coming, and not only because of the fog of pyro lingering over the RheinEnergieSTADION field that furnished us with 11 minutes of first-half stoppage time. In October’s equivalent fixture in the DFB Pokal, Köln had really rattled Bayern Munich in the first half and even taken the lead through Ragnar Ache – and still ended up on the wrong end of a 4-1 scoreline.
The world around Geißbockheim has not been a particularly happy place since. Effzeh came into this Englische Woche on a run of seven games without a win, which was even harder to swallow after an extremely promising start. Worse still, head coach Lukas Kwasniok – who started this season embracing the city and the club’s spirit with his wearing of replica shirts on the touchline – was recently targeted by Köln fans in Saturday’s draw at Heidenheim, with a banner reading “Kwasni Yok” (“yok” being no in Turkish), credited to the Wilde Horde ultras group.
It had as much to do with Kwasniok’s perceived off-field demeanour as the waning results, which the coach responded to in denying he had stopped players from going to a fan event. With sporting director Thomas Kessler having to sort out relations between the coach, the hardcore supporters and a pair of disgruntled players in Luca Waldschmidt and Florian Kainz, it did not bode well for facing the champions and runaway leaders. “I just hope that we might be able to annoy Bayern,” Kwasniok had said, seemingly more in hope than expectation.
Jahmai Simpson-Pusey might have wondered what he has walked into. The 20-year-old, a Manchester City academy graduate and last year’s Premier League 2 player of the season, joined on loan with an option to buy just over a week ago, after a frustrating first half-season at Celtic. With Köln’s defensive injuries he has been thrown straight in and if that wasn’t enough, his home debut pitted him directly against Harry Kane.
“It was great, a great experience for me,” Simpson-Pusey told the Guardian afterwards. “And I feel I didn’t do too badly against him.” The same could be said for his new team. They took the lead here as they had in October – this time via Linton Maina’s goal, a well-hit left-footer after a charging counterattack that surprised Manuel Neuer as much as it did the 50,000 sold-out crowd. Bayern’s goalkeeper got a big hand on it and probably should have saved it but it was a bolt from the blue rather than the culmination of pressure, even if Saïd El Mala had forced Neuer to save with his legs in the first minute.
Stuttgart 3-2 Eintracht Frankfurt
Borussia Dortmund 3-0 Werder Bremen
Hamburg P-P Bayer Leverkusen
Mainz 2-1 Heidenheim
Wolfsburg 2-1 St Pauli
Hoffenheim 5-1 Borussia Mönchengladbach
Köln 1-3 Bayern Munich
RB Leipzig 2-0 Freiburg
Vincent Kompany’s men were forced to break out a few fragments of their absolute A-game to lift themselves back into the game. Serge Gnabry’s equaliser was a true moment of inspiration, with him running out of room by the byline so deliberately hitting his shot into the ground to loop over Manuel Schwäbe, Mesut Özil-style (Schwäbe later grumbled that Gnabry hadn’t meant it, Bayern sporting director Max Eberl disagreed).
Meanwhile, Simpson-Pusey helped to man the barricades during a second half in which Bayern had the upper hand, but rarely felt as if they had Effzeh under total siege. The man from Huddersfield was finding the deep end of the Rhein comfortable enough for swimming. “It’s what I wanted,” he insisted of being relied upon from the get-go. “I wanted to play, and I’ve been wanting to play for the past seven months. I’m very grateful for it.” His composure on the ball was notable in the midst of a game where Köln had a touch over 27% possession. “I’m the central one of the five [at the back] so I can’t be panicking,” he said. “I need to be calm on the ball and if I’m calm, everyone in front of me will be as well.”
In the end one lapse cost Köln; having held Bayern for over 70 minutes Hiroki Ito headed back a long Luis Díaz cross after a set-piece for Kim Min-jae to nod in from close range, an infuriatingly simple goal after such an effort. Shortly before the end Bayern wrapped up the victory, with substitute Lennart Karl stroking home a Díaz pass after the Colombian had been set away by an extraordinary, curving crossfield pass by Kane, delivered as the striker was falling backwards in the centre circle. For a second time, Bayern had had to conjure a circus trick to undo their hosts.
It gave Bayern the best Hinrunde record in Bundesliga history – at the halfway stage they have dropped just four points from 17 games, a high watermark only matched by Pep Guardiola’s vintage (though Vincent Kompany’s team have a +53 goal difference, as opposed to the +35 of Guardiola’s side in 13-14). The two unlikely teams to disrupt them thus far had been Union Berlin and Mainz. Köln almost made it three.
Will the match help Kwasniok? The generous full-time applause for the home side’s efforts suggested perhaps, though this a volatile environment. “Everything starts from scratch tomorrow,” warned Kompany despite his side’s extraordinary record, and it will be the same for Köln. Shooting for the stars comes naturally to this club; taking a deep breath and measuring a strategy sometimes less so.
Talking points
• Stuttgart followed up their stunning work in Leverkusen by edging out Eintracht Frankfurt in a Tuesday night thriller after Nikolas Nartey’s late winner from another Josha Vagnoman delivery overshadowing Eintracht debutant Ayoube Amaimouni-Echghouyab after his sensational debut equaliser. Nartey deserved his moment too, though, returning from a catalogue of injuries in what his sporting director Fabian Wohlgemuth called “an extraordinary story”.
• Calmer waters in Dortmund after they dispatched a woeful Werder Bremen 3-0; Serhou Guirassy came on to break his barren run and score the third, set up by the hustle of Jobe Bellingham. Fábio Silva was chosen to start ahead of Guirassy, and Silva smartly made himself the first to congratulate the Guinean for his goal, while Niko Kovac congratulated himself. “I don’t want to pat myself on the back,” he said, “but I think the plan worked. Games open up in the second half; you get more space, more room to get a shot off.”
• Finally, finally, Mainz won, with victory over Heidenheim – their first under Urs Fischer, their first in the Bundesliga since September and their first at home in the Bundesliga in 11 months – to rise off the bottom. “I couldn’t care less what happened in the 90 minutes,” admitted sporting director Niko Bungert, and there had been nervy closing stages after Saturday’s loss of a two-goal lead at Union. “We’re just happy.”
• After two games fell to the weather in Saturday’s programme, more snow in the north meant Tuesday’s game between Hamburg and Leverkusen was called off at short notice. To compensate travelling fans Die Werkself are refunding their supporters’ tickets whilst leaving them still valid for the rearranged fixture (and finding a spot for it won’t be easy with Leverkusen’s packed calendar). HSV gave away the unused food from the Volksparkstadion to local community groups.
| Pos | Team | P | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bayern Munich | 17 | 53 | 47 |
| 2 | Borussia Dortmund | 17 | 17 | 36 |
| 3 | RB Leipzig | 16 | 13 | 32 |
| 4 | Stuttgart | 17 | 7 | 32 |
| 5 | Hoffenheim | 16 | 13 | 30 |
| 6 | Bayer Leverkusen | 16 | 10 | 29 |
| 7 | Eintracht Frankfurt | 17 | -1 | 26 |
| 8 | Freiburg | 17 | -2 | 23 |
| 9 | Union Berlin | 16 | -3 | 22 |
| 10 | Borussia M'gladbach | 17 | -6 | 19 |
| 11 | Wolfsburg | 17 | -11 | 18 |
| 12 | Cologne | 17 | -4 | 17 |
| 13 | Werder Bremen | 16 | -13 | 17 |
| 14 | Hamburg | 16 | -10 | 16 |
| 15 | Augsburg | 16 | -15 | 14 |
| 16 | Mainz | 17 | -12 | 12 |
| 17 | St Pauli | 16 | -14 | 12 |
| 18 | Heidenheim | 17 | -22 | 12 |
