I've never rated this team highly and they remind me of Southampton in England but I have a slight interest in them because two players of theirs are from my birth country [ Moses Sichone & Andrew Sinkala]. Do they have any chance of surviving the drop?
I don't think they will make it, but you never know.. it's really a shame. 1.FC Köln is a club with great tradition and amazing fans.
Too bad for them. And how is Basel doing? I used to watch Swiss teams like F.C Sion, F.C Zurich and Grasshoppers in the champions league. In fact I knew almost every team in the league. That was like 6-8 yrs ago [ I think you had like 10-12 teams]. Refresh my memory a bit. Does Johnson Bwalya ring a bell to you? Used to play in the swiss league not sure what division
Basel is doing quite alright, heading to our 10th championship 1. FC Basel 20 59 : 18 56 2. Young Boys Bern 20 42 : 27 41 3. Servette Genf 20 36 : 32 34 4. FC Thun 20 28 : 35 27 5. Grasshoppers Zürich 20 35 : 43 24 6. FC Aarau 20 34 : 42 22 7. FC Zürich 20 31 : 33 20 8. FC St. Gallen 20 26 : 38 20 9. FC Wil 20 25 : 37 20 10. Xamax Neuchatel 20 19 : 30 16 We now have a league with 10 teams. Basel is way ahead in all aspects (team, finances, stadium, fans), averaging almost 30'000 and expanding the stadium to 40'000 during the next few years. Lets hope the other teams catch up when they get their stadiums, otherwise we're gonna have a league like the scottish one, where Basel is Celtic and there are no Rangers... FC Sion by the way almost went bankrupt, but now they're back in the 2nd league (called Challenge League) doing quite alright, and averaging around 8000 iirc which is really good for that league (lots of very unattractive teams.. LOTS). I hope they'll soon get back up. Unfortunately I don't know a Johnson Bwalya ? Oh and If you've been following the league 6-8 years ago, you might want to know that two clubs with great tradition - FC Lugano and Lausanne -Sports - went bankrupt and now have to fight their way back up.. And FC Lucerne is about to come back to the top league next season.
Thanks for the information. Must be tough supporting a team that wins every year. Not that you don't want them to win but sometimes you need a team to hate! e.g Arsenal lol Just playin'
Actually Cologne has the finances of a mid-table team and shouldn't be a relegation candidate. Somehow they failed to do a major cut and sort out lots of players, who are already failing to help the team since years (the Bielefeld-syndrome ) It got better since Rettig became GM, but still they got to improve. They got chances to stay in, but it'll be difficult especially as they got rivals with more talent.
Surprisingly my No.1 relegation pick Frankfurt started to win (8 points out of 4 matches since winter break). Cologne? I haven't seen them play that often but they didn't looked too bad in Dortmund last Sunday. my prediction: relegation
Heh, we don't win every year. Two years ago we became champion for the first time since 22 years, last year it was Grasshoppers.. so basically it's just this season. And we certainly have more than enough teams to hate
I must say, I'm very disappointed of Cologne this year, I really thought, they had made that cut you mentioned and improved their team with players like Voronin, Ebbers, Dugan and Heinrich (who was overrated for a long time IMO, but still a good Bundesliga player). Even though there are quite a lot of matches to play, I think Cologne is No 1 candidate for relegation.
What about Berlin? Real poor form their too, with a good squad of players. Köln look doomed. Stadium looks good for 2006.
anyone know the contract status for koln striker andrej voronin? it's no surprise to mainz fans that he often seems to be koln's most dangerous player in every game. there are rumors abounding that he has a clause in his contract that if Koln are relegated, he is free to sign with another team... and, should say...mainz05 promote...he might be able to return as the (not so) prodigal son to the bruchwegstadion. again it is just a rumor, but i wondered if any kolners had heard anything in that regard.
i think they'll be relegated but they've got a good team and good situation, so they'll probably be a favorite to jump back up. they need to spend money a little more wisely and get a good team together. there's no reason with the size of stadium, city, fanbase, etc., that they can't be a major player in german football after some rough years.