Well, last weekend's Saturday Bundesliga match in the US was Bayer v. Bayern. Shame on Leverkusen. This is not the way soccer should be played. That being said, I was ecstatic at the result -- Leverkusen needed the win, and Bayern needed the loss. (This way the top of the table is still contested). But what an ugly game. The one good thing about the ugly game is that I can now mellow out and get back to routing for Dortmund. Last year I almost became a Leverkusen fan even though my team, Dortmund won the title. The reason was that Leverkusen played attractive attacking soccer, whereas I caught a lot of dull Dortmund games. Now I can go back to routing for Dortmund. I am sure that part of the ugliness was just "payback". But I would swear that Basturk was getting a bonus for each person he knocked down. He was like the tasmanian devil in Bugs Bunny. In general, the Bayern guys were better behaved and calmer. BUT THEN Kahn came out and grabbed Brdaric's neck. Kahn is out of control. Brdaric did not deserve the first yellow card. I was happy to see that Bayern still has trouble at left back without Lizerazu in the lineup as I have been predicting since the beginning of the season. I thought Hargreaves looked particularly bad there. Bayer made a good use of this weak-point. Even though harrassing Hargreaves did not produce a goal, the time that Bayer spent in the corner must have raised Olli's blood pressure and that may be what caused him to lose control.
This game was very much criticised indeed. I got to say that referee Hellmut Krug - usually a very good one - is not innocent for having this rough game. At the beginning it was fully okay IMO. But then the ref assistant called four wrong offside situations against Leverkusen (3x offside, 1x foul)- all situations, in which they would have had a one on one situation. I think the third of these decisions was when Brdaric continued playing and shot the ball into the net - sorry to correct you, but this is a correct yellow according to the rules. What happened then caused the whole excitement in this game. Kahn against Brdaric was the key situation - call it misconduct, unsportsmenlike behaviour or whatever: Kahn must have been sent off. Brdaric naturally is outraged for getting the same punishment as Kahn, loses his nerves and fouls in the next situation again to be ejected. If the ref had decided correctly and sent Kahn off, then this ejection wouldn't have happened. And I also claim that the game had been less rough. Cause then the whole hacking started. I share the general German opinion that Kahn, Schneider and Robert Kovac must have been sent off - I don't see where Bastürk did something 'evil', also in the media nobody mentioned him in this context (and the Tasmanian Devil is great ).
Who was the guy who went down to yell at the linesman? Our Tv commentator said it was Ilja Kaenzig but I don't think it was.
Bdaric provoked Kahn by shooting at his well goal after the whistle had blown. Yes, Ollie was a little hot under the collar and he should control himself better. His treatment at stadiums across Germany has been less than ideal this year so they must be getting to him. What I had to laught about was Bdaric's statements to the press that he "feared for his life, etc" I never realized he was such a weichei. Perhaps he should look for a place in Frauen Fussball.
As a former goalkeeper I would also be angry if someone shot after the whistle, but I would never grab the girl by the neck. I don't remember thinking that the shot was ripped or very hard. What is worse is the linesman missed the call and nothing would have happened if he had done his job.
I hope you got that he was over-dramatizing and that he didn't take his words seriously. The Kahn-action however, is misconduct/unsportsmenlike behaviour - no matter how hard it was or how much Brdaric was feared to death. If you're doing that as field player the ref wouldn't hesitate a second and sent you off if you're grabbing the neck of an opponent.
Olaf, I agree that Basturk did not do anything evil or and do not think he needed to be sent off. That being said, his play was much more physical than I am accustomed to seeing from him. It was his attitude early in the game that gave me the impression Bayer was gonna play rugby instead of soccer. The Lucio goal was beautiful though, eh? A friend of mine described the game as "classic English soccer". These day I don't see the English game as being so rough. The place I have seen physical play like that is watching the Belgian teams (e.g. Anderlecht last year) in Champion's League. Glad you liked the Tasmanian Devil joke.
Yes, that was meant sarcastically. I agree with your comments on Kahn, he should have seen red. By the way, Bayern often likes to get very physical with their opponents but few have the guts to do the same to them. Leverkusen was pretty rough but I think they showed courage in not letting Bayern push them around.