Who will promote?

Half of the season played also in 2.Bundesliga, so we got a serious picture of who'll be the ones to promote. What are your three teams?

1 Cologne, 39 pts. Only team still undefeated in pro soccer, something that'll most likely change in the cup quarter final in Munich at the latest. What makes them the favourite besides a 9 pt gap of course, is that they are not playing a really superb soccer, but at the end they are winning their games, also many close ones - bit of Bayern style in 2.Bundesliga .

2 Frankfurt, 33 pts. A little surprise because originally the teams of the last years, which failed to reach the big aim, were better. The big problem for them: key player and offence organiser Rolf-Christel Guie-Mien used his buyout option and left, and this of all teams in the world to...

3 Freiburg, 33 pts. Little sensation that Guie-Mien now is here and not in Bundesliga. But this once again also shows that Freiburg is still very much underestimated in German soccer. Already when relegating they had a mid-size Bundesliga budget and now they kept almost the whole roster. Regarding the finances you can seriously call them Bayern Munich of 2.Bundesliga, although still many think that they are the cute little underdog.

4 Mainz, 30 pts. Not a lot of last year's attractive soccer remained, in which Mainz was the first who did not promote although having more than 58 pts (64). They seemed to struggle a lot and always lost the games when they had the opportunity to get closer. At the end they improved and now are in a good position to attack. Strength and weakness is top striker Andrej Voronin, who is involved in almost every goal. If Mainz doesn't promote, then he'll leave the club as free transfer.

5 Aachen, 29 pts. Almost the biggest surprise this year. One of the best crowds in German soccer carried them into a superb position. Long time it looked better, but when Coach Berger had to face a surgery because of cancer, the team lost too many points under the assistant coach. Berger now is back on the bench and we'll see if they can get closer.

6 Trier, 27 pts. Best promoted team from Regionalliga. As many promoted teams they mainly live by high energy and lots of will. It can be doubted though that they will have a serious influence in the promotion race.

7 Duisburg, 27 pts. From relegation to promotion candidate within weeks. Almost loss after loss under Littbarski, who almost yelled that he wants to be fired, but the officials left time with that decision. Bernard Dietz, an old veteran who refuses to coach in pro soccer for ideological reasons, was hired as interims coach - and they won five straight games. Now with Norbert Meier an unknown Coach takes over and we'll see how he does on the bench.

8 Oberhausen, 26 pts. King Aleks (Ristic) on a defensive success trip with Oberhausen. Just two teams scored less goals, but they collect many points despite of that. Interesting that more than half of the goals were scored by players who came in during the game, which led Ristic to the conclusion "I'm a bad coach, I'm always dressing the wrong players".

9 Fürth, 25 pts. The team is underperforming so far and should be able to improve, but questionable whether they can compensate such a big gap.
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My secure picks are Cologne and Freiburg. Everything else is difficult. I've got to admit that 2.Bundesliga is quite uninteresting this year as there are only a few love/hate teams in there. I think that Frankfurt will drop, but who'll replace them? Mainz is definitely less convincing than last year, but the situation is promising. Regarding the attractivity of the game, I'd love to see Fürth getting involved - something I wouldn't count out too early, but it's difficult of course. And I can't seriously imagine the other four to make it, although over the last years there often were some who weren't on the bill. So, my choice is Mainz.

 

I kind of agree, but you leave out Oberhausen and Duisburg - not exactly what I call exciting. Then rather some new ones like Mainz (+: sympathetic and good coach, improving stadium), Aachen (+: old traditional team, great fans) or Fürth (+: modern stadium, most attractive soccer of the candidates, and most important: best jersey in 2.Bundesliga )

 

FC Gütersloh 2000, my home town team, playing in D4.

Photo: the green-white jersey, kind of Celtic look
http://www.greuther-fuerth.de/v2/images/ecards/ecard_prof_sascha_roesler.jpg

 

Gütersloh's is uglier than Fürth's. Here's a pic (the white version is better)
http://www.fcg2000.de/images/jpg/spieltage/10.spieltag/Nach-2-3.jpg

IMO Hertha is still today having the best jersey of Bundesliga: http://www.interneters.de/hertha/trikot.htm

 

IIRC it was the ref Don't remember 100%, but the pk leading to the 1-0 for Union was quite a bad joke for them I think. No excuse for losing though.

 

We'll see that in summer I guess.