The Germans are still on a break and will be for another week yet. With an 18-team league, proper breaks in summer and winter, is it any wonder that they (with very few exceptions) always turn up to the major international championships?
It's been a tight competition this season. Inevitably, Bayern have been among the front runners, but it's in danger of imploding down in Bavaria. Lukas Podolski, frustrated by a lack of opportunities, especially with Miroslav Klose and Luca Toni both misfiring badly, will be going back to his former club Cologne at the end of the season and the announcement was made along with a broadside fired at Jurgen Klinsmann. Willy Sagnol, so long a regular in the back four will shortly announce his retirement as he has failed to recover from an Achilles injury and ructions are afoot with Mark van Bommel reportedly told to "take or leave" a new contract offer.
While Bayern have been tripping over themselves, it's league new boys Hoffenheim that have made hay. Bankrolled by Dietmar Hopp, the chap who set up and subsequently sold software giants SAP, their progress is remarkable. And it's not just the money. At each stage that they've gone up, they've added to the side players that can take them to the next level. And it's worked. The man in charge is Ralf Rangnick who left Ruhr giants Schalke to take over at the tiny village side when they were way down in the regional leagues. Like the more successful owners in other leagues (think Randy Lerner at the Villa), Hopp is a hands-off chairman who leaves footballing matters solely to Rangnick, nicknamed "The Professor", a soubriquet in football that normally means 'he wears glasses and once read a broadsheet paper', and Rangnick has responded. He's got so far up the noses of the more established, old-school coaches to the point at which Uli Hoeness referred to him as a "smart alec". The second half of the season could be tough without leading goalscorer - for the club and in the league as a whole - Vedad Ibsevic who tore ligaments in his knee and is out for the season. Finding a replacement for those goals is key to their fortunes.
Bayer Leverkusen started brightly, but have begun to fall away. They're not out of it, for sure, but they need to turn current form around to maintain a push. Patrick Helmes is the bright young thing of German football - Germany's Benzema if you like - and his goals are keeping Bayer up there. Hertha and Hamburg too are well in the mix. Hertha are built on sold defensive foundations while Hamburg are winning games by the odd goal. Nigel de Jong (the club wangled £17m out of Man City for him when he had a £2.3m release clause in his contract) has gone and Ivica Olic could be on his way to Bayern, but they've a good manager in Martin Jol and should provide a stern challenge all season long. Ruhr rivals Schalke and Dortmund are locked together in mid-table. Both are tight in defence, but aren't scoring enough goals to the point at which Schalke boss Fred Rutten is considered under pressure. The derby game early in the season was a cause of controversy with Schalke 3-0 up. After Dortmund came back to 3-2, Schalke duo Christian Pander and Fabian Ernst were both dismissed, and a dodgy penalty awarded a minute from time was put away by Alexander Frei to level things. And just before the board went up to indicate the amount of added time to be played, the referee blew for full time. An investigation is underway as the spectre of match fixing rears it's head once more.
Bremen, Wolfsburg and Stuttgart are all drifting, neither pushing on to Europe nor being in danger of the drop. Bremen can't stop scoring, hitting five on four occasions, but they concede far too many. The goals of Grafite are keeping Wolfsburg out of danger while Mario Gomez is doing likewise for Stuttgart. Premiership watchers will be pleased to know that Jens Lehmann's penchant for yellow cards goes unabated. He's picked up three already.
Everyone from Cologne down is in bother. Cologne simply do not draw, but have won enough to be ahead of immediate danger. The rest don't. The bottom six clubs have won just 22 matches between them with Bochum just one. And yet Monchengladbach's incompetence is keeping them off the bottom. Energie don't score enough - 12 in 17 games is woeful - and Karlsruhe and Arminia aren't much better. Eintracht aren't doing too badly, but have copped for a few hidings and Hannover are just going nowhere. One thing all these sides have in common is a lack of any sort of quality. In this league, the haves and have-nots are a thrupenny bus ride apart.
The league resumes on 31st of January and it promises to be a tight race at both ends.
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