Football Update: Preview of the German Bundesliga before the start of the season
Bundesliga in Germany is one of the most consistent leagues in the world and after stellar performances in the world cup, the German team turned heads worldwide and the stock prices of their players rose sharply.
The German national team finished third at the world cup, while Bayern Munich became the only German side in 8 years to reach the final of the Champions League, FC Hollywood completed a domestic league and cup double and helped the country overtake Italy in the UEFA rankings into the third place.
Germans proudly claim that the Bundesliga is the best league in the world and with an average attendance of 41802 persons per game, the fact can hardly be argued. Only Indian Premier League and NFL top that figure but neither of these two have that many teams or games spanning a whole year.
In short, things are looking good for German football and with the new season starting at the weekend, the experts believe it could be a classic one and the fans could not have asked for a better curtain raiser than current Champions, Bayern Munich taking on their predecessors Wolfsburg.
The only concern for the neutral is the style that Luis Van Gaal’s team play. Too often, they are boring and have no creativity on the ball but it’s a style that suits them and with that very style, they almost conquered Europe least season.
The current Bayern side with the likes of Thomas Muller, Phillp Lahm, Miroslav Klose and Bastian Schweinsteiger is the one of the best squads around Europe and there is fear among some circles that this Bayern side will run away with their 23rd title with weeks to spare.
Schalke ran Bayern close last year and in the end finished 5 points adrift of the eventual champions, while Bayern Leverkusen again fell off the pace towards the end of the season after a very impressive 24 game unbeaten run to start the season.
Schalke this season has added two marquee names to their squad in Raul and Christoph Metzelder from Real Madrid and look to be serious this time around.
Raul has already made himself a fan favourite in Ruhr, where he scored two goals in his very first match against Bayern Munich.
However, the biggest spenders of this summer in the Bundesliga are Stuttgart, Hamburg, Schalke and Wolfsburg with all four spending over 10 million Euros (peanuts when compared to Manchester City’s expenditures.)
Wolfsburg are the highest spending team in the league with a spree of 23.4 million Euros, half of which were spent on defender Simon Kjaer.
Arne Freidrich has also arrived at Volkswagen Arena from the relegated Hertha Berlin and will give the defence that conceded 58 goals last season some formidability.
But the biggest signing that Die Wolfie have made is not of a player but a manager as they brought in Eredevisie winning Steve Mclaren of FC Twente in a bid to challenge Bayern for the title.
According to the pre season predictions, Schalke and Wolfsburg will be the biggest threat to Bayern Munich and their quest for a 23rd league title but it would be foolish to write off the likes of Werder Bremen and Bayer Leverkusen.
The transfer of Mesut Ozil and Sami Khedira to Real Madrid may have weakened Stuttgart and Werder Bremen but they still have plenty of firepower left to push Bayern to the limits
While at the bottom end of the table it is expected that newly promoted Kaiserslautern, FC St Pauli, along with Hannover and FC Nurnberg will be entangled in a battle for relegation to German second division.
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