Saturday's Results: Arminia Bielefeld 1 - 0 Wolfsburg Bayer Leverkusen 2 - 4 Bochum (Bochum on a roll!) Borussia Dortmund 3 - 1 Stuttgart Energie Cottbus 0 - 4 Hansa Rostock (Rostock, too!) Hamburger SV 0 - 3 Bayern Munich Monchengladbach 3 - 0 Kaiserslautern Munich 1860 3 - 0 Werder Bremen
Bielefeld vs Wolfsburg: Basically only one team was playing, and this was Wolfsburg. Bielefeld hardly had a shot on goal, but short before halftime Brinkmann scored their lead. Klimowicz also scored for Wolfsburg with two minutes left to play, but the referee wrongly anulled it because of offside. Dortmund vs Stuttgart: Stuttgart protected Balakov and Hleb for the UI Cup final. Dortmund was dominating the whole game and scored by Koller (38) and Dede (66) - until Dundee got Stuttgart back into the game with a pk (77/extremely stupid mistake and foul by Kehl). Stuttgart woke up, but a steal (foul!) and the following counter attack secured the three points for Dortmund (Ewerthon/89) 1860 vs Bremen: 1860 wasn't as superior as the result tells. Borowski missed a pk for Werder when the score was 1-0 (Schroth/31). The better chance taking helped 1860 to the victory with further goals of Cerny and Max. Next to the pk Werder missed three 100% chances. M'gladbach vs K'lautern: K'lautern disappointed once again and only because of Gladbach's mercy the score was just 3-0. Joris van Hout scored twice (23/47) - his first goals in the league that counted after one against Bayern in the first game wrongly was anulled. Münch added the other goal (36) Cottbus vs Rostock: Cottbus is surprisingly week at the moment, even at home. Rostock OTOH is secure and won lots of quality - they are the only game without goal against so far. Again Rydlewicz scored two goals (17/64), Prica had his first BL goal (27) and Wibran scored the other one (47). Leverkusen vs Bochum: For 13 minutes it looked like an easy game for Bayer. The lead by Simak (10) was just a logical consequence of the superiority. But the Gudjohnsson equalised with Bochum's first chance (13) and Leverkusen lost every bit of self-confidence. Wosz (33) and Fahrenhorst (34) cared for Bochum's half-time lead. Leverkusen started strong after the break - a goal by Lucio was wrongly anulled because of offside (47). When Christiansen scored on a counter attack (60) the game was decided. Franca only could make the score look a little bit nice in his Bundesliga debut (76). Hamburg vs Bayern: In the first half Hamburg seemed to be scared of Bayern, who dominated throughout the whole 45 minutes. But they only scored one goal (Pizarro/25) - and this after a wrong free kick decision. The second half was on a low level until the final ten minutes. Romeo scored the equaliser for Hamburg, but the ref saw a foul of Meijer before - we've got to assume that it was the right decision as Meijer signalised the ref that the decision was right though the TV pics couldn't nearly show a foul in this situation. Pizarro's second goal decided the game (85) and Zickler (90) cared for a clear result
Schalke vs Hertha 0-0: Especially in the second half both teams had chances to win the game. The best chance were two post shots by Hertha in the 45th. Nürnberg vs Hannover 3-1 Nürnberg was clearly superior in the first 75 minutes, but they needed a ridiculous pk to take the lead; later on the ref additionally refused to give Hannover a pk. Ciric scored the first two goals for Nürnberg, Cacau added the third before N'Diaye made the result look nicer for Hannover.
Team of the day: Jentzsch (1860) - Münch (M'gladbach), Costa (1860), Lense (Bielefeld) - Buckley (Bochum), Gudjonsson (Bochum), Wosz (Bochum), Rydlewicz (Rostock) - van Hout (M'gladbach), Cacau (Nürnberg), Pizarro (Bayern) Player of the day: Rene Rydlewicz
Some jubilees I didn't mention yet: 1st games for: Diouf, de Guzman (Hannover), Varela (Schalke), Hansen (Bielefeld), Teber (Kaiserslautern) 1st goal for: N'Diaye (Hannover) 50th game: Fahrenhorst (Bochum) 150th game: Kiraly (Hertha), Rost (Schalke), Münch (Gladbach/+10th goal) 200th game: Ramelow (Leverkusen)
Just a last little remark to this weekend: it's funny to see how the good starts of Bochum and Rostock can be interpreted differently. Bochum has the 2nd best start ever (only Dortmund in 94/95 were 1 goal better) - but for Rostock it is the second 9 point start, last time they relegated later on.
I noticed Cacau had another name on the back of his shirt. The DSF commentators explained this, but I wasn't paying close enough attention. Can anyone enlighten me here?
His real name is Claudemir Jeronimo Barreto - latter one is the name on his jersey. I don't know the story, but I can imagine two scenarios: we're in conservative Bavaria and the people are saying "he's no star like Ronaldo, with what right can he claim an artist name?" (have in mind that he never played pro soccer in Brazil; his first team in Germany was TürkGücü Munich) or simply it was too late last season to announce him with his artist name when he suddenly was moved to the pro team.
Thanks. I saw them play at Hertha last year and could have sworn he was wearing Cacau on his shirt, but I guess I was mistaken.