Looking Around the League: Bayern Munich Drop Points to Borussia Monchengladbach

The Bundesliga returned over the weekend, after a well earned break, and we were greeted by a Bayern Munich loss to open things on Friday. Bayern are currently dealing with a depleted squad, thanks to a Covid outbreak, but even this patched together version of Bayern Munich looked fit to compete for a title, so Borussia Monchengladbach’s 2-1 win deserves plenty of credit.

So the gap at the top has now closed to ‘only’ six points. I think we’ll need a few more slips before we can call it a title race again, but this is a nice start to the Ruckrunde, at least.

Here’s a roundup of all the Bundesliga action this weekend:

Results

Bayern Munich 1-2 Borussia Monchengladbach

Leverkusen 2-2 Union Berlin

Freiburg 2-2 Arminia Bielefeld

Greuther Furth 0-0 VfB Stuttgart

RB Leipzig 4-1 Mainz

Hoffenheim 3-1 Augsburg

Frankfurt 2-3 Borussia Dortmund

Hertha Berlin 1-3 Cologne

VfL Bochum 1-0 Wolfsburg

Standings

Are Hoffenheim Good?

Hoffenheim currently sit in third place, a point ahead of Freiburg in fourth. There hasn’t been a great deal of noise about Hoffenheim this season, but they’ve been quietly chugging away. They’ve lost five times so far this season, but two of those losses have been to Dortmund and Bayern Munich. Outside of a couple upsets, like a 2-0 loss to Bochum and a goalless draw against Arminia Bielefeld, they’ve gone about their business pretty effectively.

On Saturday they beat Augsburg 3-1, in a game that saw Augsburg’s record signing Ricardo Pepi come off the bench to make his first appearance for the club.

Hoffenheim haven’t had any clear standout performers, and they haven’t been doing anything particularly flashy, but they’ve been getting results consistently so far this season. While their performances do appear to be running a little ahead of their xG, it doesn’t suggest they’re likely to drop off significantly at any point.

Halfway through the season we should start to get a pretty good idea of who can mount a serious challenge for the top four. With a number of the usual contenders having down years, teams like Freiburg and Hoffenheim might be able to sneak into the Champions League in their place.

Your Thoughts?

Who do you think will be joining Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund in the top four at the end of the season?