Bundesliga 2023/24 - Wolfsburg or Bayern? - It's the same question as the years before

Arias barely played on football for Real Madrid before moving to Barcelona, where she's seen even less minutes for their overloaded first team..... It's seen her find a total of 12 first team games over 4 years, 2 goals scored...

Meaning Wolfsburg's recruitment of players age 23 or under not looking exactly great right now. Küver, SJJ, Brand, Endemann the clubs obvious top prospects; there's now also Arias, Wilms, Nemeth, Xhemaili, Papp, Peddemors, alongside newly elevated 2nd team prospects Brinkmann, Charon, as a line of highly suspect additions to the first team.

And when you compare this to a domestic rival like Bayern, who are signing nothing but top tier youth prospects, I'm really not seeing the plan Wolfsburg have in place for their future...

 

Some interesting transfer news in the 1.Bundesliga all happening in close proximity....

Nikola Karczewska leaving Leverkusen for AC Milan, becomes another big loss for Leverkusen, and someone they'll need to replace ASAP if they want to score the goals that keeps them relevant as a talent mid-table side next season.

Mimmi Larsson announcing her intention to leave RB Leipzig, now creating a huge problem for this team next season, if it can't find a similar or better replacement to lead their attack in ways that allow Fudalla to find space as the teams main source of goals.

Then we have a 22yo Shekiera Martinez sign a contract with WSL club West Ham United, to see herself instantly loaned back to Freiburg for a whole season.... Making me wonder why they singed a young forward with over 100 appearances for a club like Frankfurt, if they don't believe in her ability to play for a WSL relegation contender...

Ending with Wolfsburg signing 21yo Norwegian DM Justine Kielland from SK Brann. And looking at the evidence of lasts seasons UWCL, even if SK Brann have better young players in different positions, I feel like this 100% a better announcement from Wolfsburg than their recent young recruitment decisions...

 

When I look at Frankfurt's CM and defensive options, I see a legit instant upgrade on what they had last season, but some major questions hanging over the effective nature of their attack...

Wolfsburg bringing a lot of new faces to the club, but not enough of these names being the type of known quantities that would instantly place them back into the position of UWCL contender.

While everyone seems to believe Bayern's team upgraded to elite status with the addition of Oberdorf, as I'm still highly sceptical of what they capable of actually accomplishing while Straus-ball in full effect...

It means right now Hoffenheim might be the 1.Bundesliga club to do the most recruitment improving themselves for the coming season. And this slightly frustrating when you consider no 1.Bundesliga club was remotely close to matching the level of UWCL semi finalist last season..

 

LOL... former Frauen Bundesliga players are everywhere ... But seriously... if you think this NWSL matches displays a legit one man army, again you might need to put more respect on the name of prime Marta, and take a look at what players like Neymar, Messi, Mbappe, Ronaldo (and many more) would regularly do to defenders in men's club football lol...

Plus the young Brazilian defender I was hoping Bayern would sign is Tarciane. A defender who seems to fit Bayern's focus on recruiting young high quality prospects for the future. Looking at their current CB options all being age 30+, I thought Tarciane could have been a huge positive for the eventual post Straus-ball era Bayern...

 

Bajings(formerly of Bayern & Bayer Lev) signs with Aston Villa

Miedema signs with Man City—I felt this would of been an good catch for the Bundesliga, at least get an big name into the league, but probably couldn’t afford her prize tag

 

Not even Juventus would be, it seems.

 

Facing Portuguese opposition in Last season UWCL, Frankfurt looked good and still managed to throw away great chances during both matches to see themselves eliminated from the group stage.

So as I continue to repeat about Frankfurt, I'm sure their big test in this seasons UWCL will be finding a way to improve themselves tactically, with Sporting Lisbon probably the perfect opponent to force Arnautis to finally showcase some form of evolution to his system, or potentially guarantee more failure...

The addition of Senß mean an improved mid-field... yes, but if we see Arnautis acknowledge the different demands of UWCL competition, finding a way to establish a stronger defence, or a more diverse/dynamic approach to attack, we might see his growing squad depth of talent be more than a collective who play well against tougher opponents, but always lose...

 

In the league Frankfurt probably needing to replicate what a prior 3rd place Hoffenheim team accomplished, by closing the persistent 10-20 goal gap that exists between themselves and Bayern.

So while reducing the amount of goals conceded would be something positive for this team to aim for... having seen Frankfurt's big games often reduced to their forwards ruining everything, I'm convinced a more efficient offense is where we could see Frankfurt finally start to beat elite opposition.

Prasnikar, Anyomi, Freigang ALL scoring 10+ league goals this season a must, with Gräwe, Chiba, and Lührßen, probably having to break expectations by contributing more quality to offense than Reuteler, or Dunst.

But in Europe, this team should be looking to establish some form of tactical change, that can finally bring consistent width to their play. Maybe resulting in something like this for UWCL competition...?
--- Anyomi -------------------------------- Freigang ---
----------------------- Prašnikar -------------------------
------------- Gräwe --------------- Senß ----------------
Lührßen ------------------------------------------- Wolter
------ Doorosun ------ Veit -------- Kleinherne ------
----------------------- Johannes ---------------------------

 

This was always a dumb situation, where KLV clearly being a better player struggling to start at Bayern, the obvious sign of why Bajings had even less chance of finding success within the same club.

I just wish Bayern would stop holding all their domestic talent hostage, allowing some of them to actually go on loan to gain important development time with other professional teams...

Why...? You really think Arsenal are letting her leave, because she's still in peak condition to perform at the elite level of the game...?

Plus Bayern already had Miedema when she was an emerging elite youth talent, winning constitutive titles within a very similar style to what we see now with Straus-ball Bayern.

And unlike Harder who I feel a slightly diminished version of the player we all saw at Wolfsburg, Miedema hasn't shown anything on her return from persistent injury to suggest she's still capable of being the same player she was prior the long battle with injury...

 

I'm slightly confused reading reports about Stroot being linked to Manchester United, as I genuinely thought this was already revealed to be a legitimate thing weeks ago...

Again, I'm sure I'm not the only one hoping the eventual exit of Stroot can end, or significantly change the so failed partnership Wolfsburg has with FC Twente...

But with Stroot leaving, it's also been quite funny seeing a few more opinions from people who don't follow 1.Bundesliga regularly, coming to the conclusion Stroots time with Wolfsburg actually highly successful...

 

Poland international Sylwia Matysik leaves Leverkusen to join 1. FC Köln... Again Köln continuing the trend of them being horrible, but still recruiting the best players from various teams who consistently finish above them lol.

Doing this enough, at some point you have to believe Köln will eventually create a good team. But it's always going to be very strange seeing them recruiting good players, thinking them still more likely to be nothing more than a relegation contender each season lol...

 

LOL, OK.. on her return form injury Gwinn was previously one of the domestic players Bayern were looking to replace with Ashley Lawrence; so with the return of Simon on the left, it's crazy to think Straus-ball will still be focused on some of the key elements of prior Bayern coaches...

Plus it needs to be said that Gwinn also seems to be one of the various Bayern domestic players who will consistently play better for the wnt than she is in her club team; suggesting she has far more to give for Bayern if utilised within a better system...

Schüller still unable to break the 20+ goal mark in league goals, Bühl getting assists but never coming close to touching her true potential in goal scoring, while Schüller and Dallmann no longer seen as relevant elements to the starting 11.

If Simon as a LB the only domestic player within Straus-ball Bayern performing at a high level, I'm honestly thinking it about time an excellent for the wnt Gwinn finally produced the same or similar next season as a RB for her club...

Simon's 2022/23 seeing 14 assists within a system the FB's provide majority of the teams width. Gwinn should be providing significantly more than the 3-4 assists she created over the past two season.

 

Look who's back...

 

Alle mal die Lupe rausholen 😅

Wir wollten euch das Tor von Elisa #Senß im gestrigen Test - aufgenommen mit der Analysekamera - trotzdem nicht vorenthalten 💥#SGE #EintrachtFrauen #B04SGE pic.twitter.com/8rUTKmwDDX

— Eintracht Frankfurt Frauen (@EintrachtFrauen) July 7, 2024

LOL... someone using the UFO lens to film footage of Senß scoring her first goal for Frankfurt.

 

Prominenter Zuwachs im U20-Trainerinnenteam 👋

Kim Fellhauer wird Co-Trainerin,
Michaela Specht wird Spielertrainerin Scouting und Analyse 🦅

Zur News: https://t.co/jDfaqd2Aa4#SGE #EintrachtFrauen #NichtOhneMeineMädels pic.twitter.com/GSB7MgL4cT

— Eintracht Frankfurt Frauen (@EintrachtFrauen) July 8, 2024

Specht chose to join Frankfurt's u20's as a player coach...

And now at a time 2.Bundesliga clubs are downsizing budgets, we see Frankfurt continue placing a lot of effort into recruiting strong coaching talent/experience for their u20 program... and I'm not completely sure why...

 

The schedule for the new season is not out yet but it's been confirmed that the opening fixture will be Turbine-Bayern in Potsdam on August 30.