Even in this most optimistic of football cities, there were days when it felt like this one would never come. If it sometimes feels as if their never-moping, always-atmospheric RheinEnergieStadion has almost otherworldly powers, there had only been one previous win for FC Köln there this season, in the derby against Borussia Mönchengladbach – way back – in October. It has been a season of slim pickings, and then some.
A lot has happened since then, if not much in the way of wins, points or even goals; a transfer ban, a slew of injuries and the departure of a beloved coach in Steffen Baumgart. Yet with Carnival on the horizon in the city of Cologne, which celebrates it like no other, the festivities getting under way in the streets at 11.11am on Thursday, this was the aperitif, whetting the appetite with a soupçon of the traditional joy and chaos.
Saturday evening’s 2-0 win over Eintracht Frankfurt had everything to satisfy the hungry. Two goals – for only the second time this season – and a healthy dose of fight and application breathed some life into a season gasping for air in recent weeks. It had a hero too, where one was badly needed.
The pre-match tribute to the 1978 double winner Heinz Simmet, who also played 259 consecutive Bundesliga game for Effzeh from 1970 to 1977, was interrupted by the visiting fans, much to the annoyance of the home supporters and the stadium announcer, Michael Trippel, who tried to battle his way through the cacophony. Still, the memory of better times left the question hanging in the air of who would be able to step up here.
Enter Faride Alidou. After scoring last week’s goal in the draw at Wolfsburg, he was included in the starting lineup for only the third time in this league season by Timo Schultz. The coach doesn’t have many options, with Davie Selke and Luca Waldschmidt out for several weeks, and so Alidou was given the nod against his parent club, having arrived on loan in summer but having been used sparingly since.
He turned out, perhaps inevitably, to be the pivotal figure. Alidou was making an incursion on the right when Niels Nkounkou pulled him down, collecting a second booking and sending Eintracht down to 10 men. From the resulting, half-cleared, set-piece Dejan Ljubicic hit the ball back into the danger area and Alidou flicked it into the net. The 22-year-old Alidou, gingerly raising his hands in the air while all around him lost their heads, was (not) celebrating only a second goal at home for Effzeh since November.
Even when Jan Thielmann sealed the deal by scoring the second, smashing a Ljubicic pass into the far corner of Kevin Trapp’s goal with a we-do-this-all-the-time assurance, it was only when an ailing Eintracht collected a second red card inside the last 10 minutes, when Tuta planted an arm in the face of Jeff Chabot for his own second yellow, that the locals began to exhale.
Each goal is always celebrated like an event at the old Müngersdorfer but it is worthy of being hailed so at the moment. These two to beat Eintracht were only Köln’s 13th and 14th of the season in 20 Bundesliga matches. It has become a running joke. When Lothar Matthäus stood in the penalty area pre-kick-off with presenter Sebastian Hellmann on Sky, he couldn’t resist dispatching a couple of balls left behind from the warm-up of home goalkeepers Marvin Schwäbe and Philipp Pentke into the net. “Now I’ve scored as many goals in front of the Südtribune as FC Köln have in the entire season,” he laughed.
There had been no possibility of Effzeh doing anything to make the front part of the team more dynamic in the January window, either. On the same December day that Baumgart’s departure – a coach whose trademark flat cap had become a popular item in the club shop – was announced, the court of arbitration for sport confirmed the club’s ban from registering players in the next two transfer windows over the signing of Jaka Cuber Potocnik, with the player found to have breached his contract and Köln deemed to have incited him to do so. The various pieces of evidence suggested incompetence rather than nefariousness but either way, the club are in a hole.
This was a long-awaited light at the end of the tunnel. “To proclaim a change for the better would perhaps be a bit too much just now,” warned the managing director, Christian Keller. “We won a game. We can see that we’re on the right track, but there is still a lot of work ahead of us.” That may be so, but hope springs eternal in this city – especially in Carnival season.
Talking points
• There was little relief, even in Carnival season, for Mainz. After Saturday’s home loss to in-form Werder Bremen, with Marvin Ducksch’s goal after 107 seconds giving Werder a third straight victory, the 05ers have no wins since 4 November and, like Köln, only 14 goals to their credit in the Bundesliga. That win over RB Leipzig three months ago, which led the club to eventually install Jan Siewart in the head coach’s post, now feels like it was in a different season and the former Huddersfield coach’s position is under threat. “We have to face reality,” said Siewart, with the lingering sentiment that not enough heads in the dressing room are. Wednesday’s catch-up game with Union Berlin, who went down 2-0 at Leipzig, couldn’t be any more vital.
• Talking of matches with huge implications, Bayern Munich couldn’t afford any slips against their bogey team Gladbach before Bayer Leverkusen’s visit next week, with Leverkusen, inspired by a Nathan Tella double, easy enough winners at Darmstadt. So naturally enough Bayern battered Gerardo Seoane’s side from the off and still found themselves a goal down to Nico Elvedi’s beautifully constructed strike. The increasingly influential teenager Aleksandar Pavlovic equalised with his first at Allianz Arena before everything came right in the closing stages; Harry Kane’s goal giving him the highest-scoring Bayern debut Bundesliga season already, Matthijs de Ligt scoring and Sacha Boey making a welcome debut. Thomas Müller also celebrated a 500th win as a Bayern player, though Alphonso Davies went off with a ligament injury – “I don’t have the words for it,” bemoaned Thomas Tuchel.
Friday: Heidenheim 0-0 Dortmund
Saturday: Cologne 2-0 Eintracht Frankfurt, Bayern. Munich 3-1 Borussia Mönchengladbach, Darmstadt 0-2 Leverkusen, Freiburg 1-3 Stuttgart, Mainz 0-1 Werder Bremen, Bochum 1-1 Augsburg
Sunday: RB Leipzig 2-0 Union Berlin, Wolfsburg 2-2 Hoffenheim
• Stuttgart stay third as Deniz Undav’s campaign to front Germany’s Euro 2024 gathers almost irresistible pace. The striker scored and laid on two assists as his team won 3-1 at Freiburg, with a Pokal quarter-final at Leverkusen next up on Tuesday – a final before the final, almost, with so many big guns knocked out. “I’m convinced we have the necessary quality,” said a quietly confident Fabian Wohlgemuth, the club’s sporting director.
• As expected, Jadon Sancho sat out Borussia Dortmund’s Friday night trip to Heidenheim with muscle tightness – Edin Terzic had warned the on-loan winger would have to be carefully managed after such a long period of inactivity – and with other creatives such as Julian Brandt and Marco Reus also missing, BVB rarely looked like scoring in a drab goalless draw. “Hardly anyone came even close to their maximum,” complained an uncharacteristically critical Terzic to Dazn.
| Pos | Team | P | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bayer Leverkusen | 20 | 38 | 52 |
| 2 | Bayern Munich | 20 | 40 | 50 |
| 3 | Stuttgart | 20 | 20 | 40 |
| 4 | Borussia Dortmund | 20 | 14 | 37 |
| 5 | RB Leipzig | 20 | 18 | 36 |
| 6 | Eintracht Frankfurt | 20 | 6 | 31 |
| 7 | Freiburg | 20 | -8 | 28 |
| 8 | Hoffenheim | 20 | -2 | 26 |
| 9 | Werder Bremen | 20 | -3 | 26 |
| 10 | Heidenheim | 20 | -7 | 24 |
| 11 | Wolfsburg | 20 | -7 | 23 |
| 12 | Augsburg | 20 | -8 | 22 |
| 13 | Borussia M'gladbach | 20 | -5 | 21 |
| 14 | VfL Bochum | 20 | -16 | 21 |
| 15 | Union Berlin | 19 | -16 | 17 |
| 16 | Cologne | 20 | -20 | 15 |
| 17 | Mainz | 19 | -17 | 11 |
| 18 | Darmstadt | 20 | -27 | 11 |
