Hoffenheim 0-0 Schalke
Dortmund 1-1 Stuttgart
Cologne 0-0 Eintracht
Nurnberg 0-2 Hannover
Freiburg 0-5 Leverkusen
Mainz 2-1 Bayern
Bochum 1-0 Hertha
Bremen 3-0 Monchengladbach
Wolfsburg 2-4 Hamburg
Promoted Mainz could probably go the rest of the season without a win and consider this a successful season after beating Bayern and condemning the Bavarians to their worst start in over 40 years. Andreas Ivanschitz put Mainz ahead with a cracking near post finish and Aristide Bancé made it two with a powerful header. In order to make a game of it, they even gave Bayern a goal when Nikolce Noveski put through his own net shortly after the break and still Bayern didn't get going. They were outplayed, outfought and out-thought by their supposedly inferior opponents and everyone bar the most ardent Eintracht fan will be smug with schadenfreude at the result. Still no Ribéry for Bayern and he's going to have to be better than ever is Louis van Gaal is to last until christmas.
Top match of the weekend was in Wolfsburg where Hamburg showed recent form wasn't just a blip by putting the champions to the sword. Paolo Guerrero and Eljero Elia had put the visitors two up inside ten minutes and Wolfsburg were visibly shaken by it. Hamburg snapped into tackles and did not let Wolfsburg settle which shook them, so they resorted to being the biggest set of whining, mincing bitches it's possible to be. Zjvezdan Misimovic was the worst. An obvious danger man, Hamburg kept a tight rein on him and didn't give him an inch and he did not like it, hurling himself to the floor at every opportunity and moaning constantly to the ref whose patience finally snapped and he got a yellow in the second half. Edin Dzeko and Grafite weren't getting the service and the frustration showed. This petulance needs Armin Veh to get a grip sooner rather than later or their debut in the Champions League could be a short one. Guerrero's opener is really a Diego Benaglio own goal, the shot crashing back off the post and into the net off Benaglio's head. Benaglio kept his side in it with a string of saves, but he was powerless to stop Elia after he'd waltzed through the defence. Misimovic led the fightback after the break, tapping in from short range after great work out wide from Christian Gentner and Obafemi Martins headed home powerfully from Misimovic's cross. Mladen Petric restored Hamburg's lead and, as the Wolves chased an equaliser, exciting substitute Romeo Castelen grabbed a fourth to seal a pulsating, if bitchy game.
Two other clubs are tied with Hamburg on seven points at the top with Leverkusen to of the heap after thumping Freiburg. Stefan Kiessling set them on their way and there were doubles for Tranquilo Barnetta and Eren Derdiyok. Schalke are up there too after their 0-0 draw at Hoffenheim who, despite some good football, have yet to win this term.
After Dieter Hecking quit Hannover, his former charges responded in decent fashion with Jiri Stajner grabbing both goals in a 2-0 win over Nurnberg. He managed to miss a penalty in between times as well. Bremen also missed a penalty, Mesut Ozil denied from 12 yards, but they were two up courtesy of Claudio Pizarro by then, his second a cheeky backheel of the highest showboat factor. Naldo added a third late on. Dortmund and Stuttgart shared the points, Nelson Valdez putting the hosts ahead with Georg Niedermeier equalising just after the break.
Bochum won their first game of the season, Antar Yahia with the only goal of the game early in the second stanza, smashing home a free-kick which really ought to have been a penalty. Cologne and Eintracht kicked each other to a 0-0 draw with Eintracht's Patrick Ochs seeing red for going too far and booting Fabrice Ehret a bit too hard. Terrible game, two poor sides, but the ref let them both away with too much and Ochs' dismissal was too late to calm things down. Ehret limped out of the game as a result and he's a big player for Cologne.
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