Chapter 64: When it rains it pours
The difficult win over Mustafa made everyone in Werder Bremen excited by the feeling of regaining what they had lost.
Since the start of this season, Werder Bremen has won four consecutive games in all competitions.
Their opponents in the next round of the German Cup have also appeared, and they will meet the Bundesliga team Augsburg.
Although the opponent is a Bundesliga team, they are currently ranked 16th in the standings and are in the relegation zone.
For relegation teams, staying in the league is their top priority, while cup competitions are something they can give up.
Therefore, everyone in Werder Bremen is full of confidence.
They felt that beating Augsburg might be easier than beating Mustafa.
There is a saying that good luck will not always favor a person.
In the fifth round of the league, Werder Bremen will challenge Freiburg away.
Werder Bremen currently ranks third in the standings, while Freiburg is eighth.
Judging from the rankings of both sides, it seems that Werder Bremen has the advantage.
But the result of this game was surprising. When the final whistle sounded, the score was 2:1, with the home team in front and the visiting team behind.
Werder Bremen lost their first Bundesliga game of the season away from home, and their three-game winning streak was ended.
In this game, Werder Bremen seemed to be under a spell. They hit four goal posts and two goals were called offside.
The players were extremely depressed after the game. They had an absolute advantage, but they just couldn't score a goal. Even if they did score a goal, it would be blown off.
In this game, Lin Quan hit the goal post and scored a goal which was called offside, and his streak of scoring in four consecutive games was also ended.
If the last German Cup match is included, his goal drought has lasted for more than 100 minutes.
But he doesn’t really care whether he scores a goal or not, as long as he can win the game and get points, that’s all that matters.
What he couldn't accept the most was that he neither scored a goal nor the team won the game.
After the game, the media reporters' attitude towards Werder Bremen immediately changed.
The media, which had previously touted them as the dark horses of the league and the ones that could cause chaos for the top clubs, have now begun to criticize them.
They criticized Werder Bremen's offense for being too dependent on Lin Quan and De Bruyne, and once these two were restricted by their opponents, they lost their offensive threat.
In addition, they believe that coach Schaaf's transformation of the team's defense has been a failure.
Werder Bremen has conceded 8 goals in five games this season, averaging 1.6 goals per game, ranking third from the bottom among the 18 Bundesliga teams.
Their weakness of being strong in attack but weak in defense has not been improved.
Although Werder Bremen is currently ranked at the top of the standings, if they cannot change these shortcomings of the team, they will definitely not go far in the league.
In fact, if they had only lost one game, the reporters would not have criticized Werder Bremen so harshly.
The reason why reporters criticized them like this is mainly because Werder Bremen's next opponent is the Bundesliga champion Bayern Munich.
Bayern Munich is in very hot form this season. They defeated Wolfsburg 3:0 in this round and have started with five consecutive wins.
If Werder Bremen had not lost this round of games and had faced the Bundesliga champions with four consecutive wins, then the outside world might think that they still had a chance to compete with Bayern.
But they had already lost a game before the top showdown with Bayern, and their morale was no longer the same as Bayern's.
Coupled with the huge gap in hard power between the two teams, almost no one outside was optimistic about them. Everyone thought that Werder Bremen would lose to Bayern Munich at home.
Bayern Munich has become even more terrifying this season. The addition of Martinez has made their strength even better.
They have won all three games in the league, Champions League group stage and German Cup and have not lost a single game so far.
Any team that played against Bayern would be defeated by their luxurious midfield and front attacking group.
With Werder Bremen's current state, it is hard to imagine how they can defeat such an undefeated team! However, not everyone supports Bayern. Dortmund fans hope that Werder Bremen can beat Bayern Munich at home and end their opponent's winning streak.
In this round of the game, Dortmund challenged the newly promoted Frankfurt away.
Although the latter is a newly promoted team, it is a dark horse, and Dortmund is in poor form this season.
Therefore, everyone in their team took this opponent very seriously and did not dare to underestimate him at all.
But a dark horse is a dark horse after all.
At Frankfurt's home ground, Dortmund played a crazy game with their opponents.
Reus, Gotze and Lewandowski scored goals in succession. Dortmund took the lead three times, but was equalized by the opponents three times.
In the end, the two sides shook hands and made peace with a score of 3:3, which was a lose-lose situation for both sides.
Frankfurt had been closely following Bayern Munich in points before, but after a draw in this game, they were left 2 points behind Bayern.
Dortmund only got one point. They only had 6 points after 5 rounds. The gap with Bayern continued to widen to 9 points, and their hopes of defending the title are getting lower and lower.
If they still want to get their hands on the championship trophy, they must not make any mistakes in the next games and must continue to win.
Other teams in the league will also need to step up and help them stop Bayern Munich and prevent them from continuing to score.
Otherwise, even if they directly defeated Bayern in the strong dialogue, they would not be able to completely eliminate the gap between the two teams.
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In the league, there are not many teams capable of posing a threat to Bayern. Apart from them, probably only Werder Bremen, Schalke 04 and Borussia Mönchengladbach have hope.
Borussia Mönchengladbach is a strange team. They are not very strong, but they are particularly good at playing against Bayern Munich.
Every time they meet Bayern, their players are very excited and can perform beyond their level, so there is a saying that the pony eats, sleeps and plays against Bayern.
As for Bremen, Dortmund feel that their individual players are very threatening and may be able to create a miracle.
In order to stimulate Werder Bremen to give their all and fight Bayern to the death, Dortmund players publicly cheered for Werder Bremen on social media.
Lewandowski tweeted:
Werder Bremen's counterattacks are particularly sharp. We have suffered twice from them. When facing Bayern Munich, they will definitely continue to use this tactic. I don't think Bayern's defense can stop their counterattacks! Gotze believes:
Werder Bremen's No. 6 (De Bruyne) is an excellent midfielder. His creativity and overall vision will help Werder Bremen win.
Reus did not make a public statement, but sent a private message to Lin Quan, asking: "How many goals do you plan to score against Bayern Munich?"
Lin Quan was a little surprised when he saw Royce's private message. He didn't expect Royce to contact him actively, nor did he expect Royce to think so highly of him.
That's Bayern's, it's not easy to score against them.
But he is not the kind of person who would show his weakness, so he replied: "Of course we will score as many goals as we can. Don't worry, Werder Bremen will definitely use all our strength against Bayern Munich!"
Seeing Lin Quan's reply, Royce couldn't help but curl up the corners of his mouth. He liked this answer.
But the other party sent another message: "Of course, it was the same when we played against Dortmund!"
The smile on Royce's face froze instantly.
…
Because of the loss and the encounter with a strong opponent, the atmosphere in Werder Bremen was very heavy before the start of the sixth round of the league.
Coach Scharf has had a stern face these days and rarely smiles.
The same was true for several assistant coaches, all of them had gloomy faces and obviously did not have much confidence in the upcoming games.
The firepower of Bayern Munich's frontcourt attack group this season is really terrifying. Robben, Ribery, Mandzukic, Gomez, Thomas Muller and others, each of them has extremely strong scoring ability.
Werder Bremen happens to be a team with very poor defense, which makes it almost impossible for them to limit the opponent's offense.
If you can’t restrict the opponent’s attack, do you have to fight with him in offense?
After the introduction of Martinez, Bayern's midfield has become stronger, not only can it supply more ammunition to the team's front line, but also can effectively intercept the opponent's attack in the midfield.
Facing such a fully upgraded version of Bayern Munich, is there really a chance of winning in an offensive competition? (End of this chapter)