[footyfan1]

I am still fuming over that loss in Mainz. It's hard to find any positives about an upcoming match with Stuttgart after such a crappy effort against Mainz. I shouldn't even be typing this, but it is already Friday and the match is Sunday in Dortmund.


One bright spot is that it looks like Sebastian Kehl will be back in the starting lineup for us. Even though Brzenska was not bad against Mainz, I hope Amedick will replace him in the starting lineup.

With Smolarek still out, we're almost guaranteed to see Frei and Valdez up front again.

I'm sure the Stuttgart defense will gear themselves toward stopping Frei until Valdez proves he can get his head out of his ass and start putting some balls in the opponent's net!

I am also curious to see if Roeber will stick with Pienaar after Pienaar's horrible performance in Mainz or if Roeber will give Lars Ricken a shot in central midfield. I'm thinking Pienaar will start, but if he's shit in the first half, we'll see Ricken in the second half.

So many questions and two more days to wait. And I'll only see this match in bits and pieces as I'll be forced to watch in my friend's pub in Erlangen. Instead of showing one match, he'll have on the "Konferenz" since the other match is the top of the table battle between Werder and Scheisse........

I'll see if Arena re-shows the match on Monday morning.

[Vfbstuttgartfan]

Well, it's not just two hours until the match. Should be a really good game, it's a shame i'll be missing the Bremen-Schalke game, but that's life. Both teams have had indifferent starts with Dortmund having a great win against Bayern, then a lame loss against Mainz and VfB being thrashed by Nuernberg then narrowly beating Bielefeld - so it's hard to say which side is on better form. I'd say Dortmund are slight favourites since they paly at home, though really it should be a tight game.

No real injuries in the VfB squad, so they should be playing like this:
--------------hildebrand
Osorio---Meira-------Delpierre-----Magnin/Boka
-------------- Pardo
--hilbert-----------------------Hitzlsperger
-----------Da Silva/Gentner/Farnerud
-----Gomez-------------------Cacau

The two positions with question marks over them are left-back and creator. Magnin got a chance on Tuesday against Bielefeld and played a very good game, so maybe he'll get the nod over Boka today.
And Da Silva has played very poorly the last few matches so either Farnerud or Gentner could get a chance at the starting spot today.

I hope VfB can win, that would be a really great result, but with that in mind, a draw i would definitely be satisfied with, as going to Dortmund is surely not an easy task, and the side is surely better than what their standing would suggest.

[footyfan1]

Originally Posted by Vfbstuttgartfan

Well, it's not just two hours until the match. Should be a really good game, it's a shame i'll be missing the Bremen-Schalke game, but that's life. Both teams have had indifferent starts with Dortmund having a great win against Bayern, then a lame loss against Mainz and VfB being thrashed by Nuernberg then narrowly beating Bielefeld - so it's hard to say which side is on better form. I'd say Dortmund are slight favourites since they paly at home, though really it should be a tight game.

No real injuries in the VfB squad, so they should be playing like this:
--------------hildebrand
Osorio---Meira-------Delpierre-----Magnin/Boka
-------------- Pardo
--hilbert-----------------------Hitzlsperger
-----------Da Silva/Gentner/Farnerud
-----Gomez-------------------Cacau

The two positions with question marks over them are left-back and creator. Magnin got a chance on Tuesday against Bielefeld and played a very good game, so maybe he'll get the nod over Boka today.
And Da Silva has played very poorly the last few matches so either Farnerud or Gentner could get a chance at the starting spot today.

I hope VfB can win, that would be a really great result, but with that in mind, a draw i would definitely be satisfied with, as going to Dortmund is surely not an easy task, and the side is surely better than what their standing would suggest.

Congrats on the victory. A typical BVB-VfB match in Dortmund. Little to no scoring with BVB disappointing once again.

[footyfan1]

Of course, as usual, I am pissed off that we lost. I did not get to see the match in its entirety because I was forced to watch in my friend's pub. Instead of just watching Scheisse take over first place, I decided to watch Germany's Men's Handball Team win the World Cup also.

It's hard to be judgemental from the little I saw of the match, so I will ask those who were there or who saw more of it what they think.


From the little I saw, here's ten things I gathered:

1) Except for a couple of guys, we did not play all that badly.

2) The guys who played badly were the usual suspects Degen and Valdez, but this time were also accompanied by Dede.

3) We again had chances, but wasted them. We have not scored a goal against Stuttgart at home in four seasons now.

4) Pienaar did not play as well as he did against Bayern, but better than he did against Mainz.

5) Brzenska was the central defender caught out of position on the Stuttgart goal.

6) Alexander Frei is the best player on this team right now.

7) Nelson Valdez is a 4.5M Euro piece of shit so far. There are no more excuses for him. For what we've gotten out of him, we could have just f#cking kept Delron Buckley around. But, Valdez fits this team well. All talk, no f#cking action.

Since I supported getting Valdez, but not at such a fee, I still feel like I did once I realized George W. Bush is the uncaring liar all my friends said he was. Completely fooled.


8) Christoph Metzelder seems to be taking over the leadership of the team. At least so far.......


9) The team is still not playing as a cohesive unit. Better than before, but I think guys like Degen and Valdez need to taste some bench time.


10) It was good to see Sebastian Kehl on the pitch again........




Kicker Ratings for BVB players:



Weidenfeller 3 - Didn't see enough to say much.


Degen 5 - I have a new name for him. "Three Step F#ck Up" If Degen takes three steps or more with the ball, you can bet he'll f#ck something up.


Brzenska 3.5 - Not bad again, but I thought he was the one out of position on Gomez' goal.


Metzelder 3.5 - Again, as I said above, he seems to be taking over as leader on this team. That is, if we keep him around.......



Dede 5 - Didn't see enough to comment. Maybe that's the problem.



Kruska 4 - With the job he's doing, I don't see any reason to rush Kehl back. Unless we can teach him to play right back and put Degen's ass on the bench where he belongs.



Tinga 4 - Maybe the long season is starting to get to him???



Kringe 4 - Didn't see enough of him to comment.


Pienaar 3 - At least forced Hildebrand to make one decent save. May be growing into what's expected of him. That's stretching it, but at least he wasn't "horrible" again like the next guy.


Valdez 5 - What a piece of shit.


Frei 4 - Again, I think the best player on this team right now.


Kehl 4 - Didn't see enough of him. Again, with the job Kruska did, I wouldn't rush Kehl back, unless we can put Kruska out on the right wing and bench Degen's sorry ass.



Also played but not long enough to be rated:

Sahin: Eventually, we may need to put the #10 on him and live or die with it.

Amoah: At least he didn't cost much.......

[Vfbstuttgartfan]

Originally Posted by footyfan1

Congrats on the victory. A typical BVB-VfB match in Dortmund. Little to no scoring with BVB disappointing once again.

Dortmund haven't been able to score in 8 of the last 9 matches between the two sides.

The match wasn't very good. I think Dortmund would've deserved the draw, but what gifted VfB the win was that they played more intelligently. They stayed back when they had to and gave good counterattacks when the opportunities arose. they were also generally much more effective with the ball. Dortmund was able to control most of the game, but were entirely uncreative.

But the match could've gone the other way. in the 59th minute, Magnin saved on the line and we went on to score 30 seconds later. If Magnin hadn't been there, it would be 1-0 BVB and then i wouldn't see VfB coming back.

Obviously i'm thankful things didn't turn out that way.

[footyfan1]

Originally Posted by Vfbstuttgartfan

Dortmund haven't been able to score in 8 of the last 9 matches between the two sides.

The match wasn't very good. I think Dortmund would've deserved the draw, but what gifted VfB the win was that they played more intelligently. They stayed back when they had to and gave good counterattacks when the opportunities arose. they were also generally much more effective with the ball. Dortmund was able to control most of the game, but were entirely uncreative.

But the match could've gone the other way. in the 59th minute, Magnin saved on the line and we went on to score 30 seconds later. If Magnin hadn't been there, it would be 1-0 BVB and then i wouldn't see VfB coming back.

Obviously i'm thankful things didn't turn out that way.

Well, from what I've seen and what's been written in the press and on our e-mail list, I can only assume that while Gomez was Brzenka's man on the goal, somehow a "misunderstanding" between Kehl and our perpetual f#ck up, Philipp Degen, led to Gomez being so open.

I don't know. I'm counting on the opinions of those at the game or who watched it live non-stop.

All I know is that you hit the nail on the head about our team when you used the words, "entirely uncreative."

I think we have an outstanding defense. I think we have one good striker (Frei) and the rest are shitbags, but the midfield stinks above all else.

That, I would definitely agree with anyone on.

That and VfB definitely played a more intelligent match........