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With just one game before the curtain is drawn on the 2014/2015 German Bundesliga, on a day when all other top five teams recorded expected league wins, only Bayern Munich, the league winners were beaten, yet another loss for the run-away league leaders, this time away at Freiburg, the third straight league loss and the fifth loss in six matches in all competition. The past few weeks have been one that Pep Guardiola and his Bayern tired stars would be quick to forget. Bayern are not only losing matches (including matches they could and should have easily won), they are not scoring enough and have been conceding an awful lot.
With the top four teams; Bayern (76 points), Wolfsburg (68 points), Borrusia Moenchengladbach (66 points) and Bayern Leverkusen (61 points) all but guaranteed a place in Europe next season, the first three teams automatically qualify for the group stage of next season’s UCL while the fourth placed team, which most likely would be Bayern Leverkusen would still have to play a two-leg third round qualifying to confirm their participation in next season’s UCL.
The two main slots of the German Bundesliga for next season’s Europa cup go to the fifth placed team (via automatic qualification) and the sixth placed team (via qualifying rounds) which Schalke 04 (48 points) and either of Augsburg (46 points) or Borussia Dortmund (43 points) are currently poised to earn. However, due to a recent change in UEFA rule which is due to come into effect, if a club side in Germany that already qualified for Europe for the following season via the Bundesliga, also wins the DfB cup (in this case, Wolfsburg, who are already guaranteed a top four finish and are due to face Borrusia Dortmund in the final of the DfB cup) then, the eventual seventh placed team would take its place in the qualifying rounds for next season’s Europa cup but should Dortmund win the DfB cup and finish anything less than sixth position, Dortmund will not be playing the Europa cup qualifying rounds for next season.
The bottom teams in the lower part of the Bundesliga table were not without their own drama. In spite of their surprise individual 2-1 wins over the weekend against Bayern Munich and FC Augsburg respectively, SC Freiburg (34 points), Hannover 96 (34 points) and are still not safe from relegation while the bottom three teams VfB Stuttgart (33 points) in spite of their weekend 2-1 against Hamburger SV, Hamburger SV (32 points) and Paderborn (31 points) barring a final day miracle look increasingly set to be relegated to the lower division.
With all the unknowns including the eventual Europa league qualifiers for next season from the Bundesliga and the rock bottom teams to be relegated which will not be known until Match Day 34, which also happens to be the final day of the 2014/2015 German Bundesliga season, the elated Hannover 96’s captain, Lars Stindl was right when he was quoted to have said after his side’s surprise but precious win against Augsburg over the weekend that “everything will be decided next week”… For the love of football.
by: Idowu Olagoke KUNLERE
