Dortmund banish some of their 2023 ghosts while Leipzig and Freiburg create their own

The Guardian

19-05-2025

The last time Borussia Dortmund had enjoyed an end-of-season run-in as successful as this was that season. Nearly two years on Niko Kovac and company didn't quite lay the ghost of 2023 but began to definitively draw a line under the fallout from it. On this occasion BVB faced what should have been a straightforward final day task at home and made it so. Where they had been cowed by nerves against Mainz in the last game of 2022-23 and let the Bundesliga slip through their collective fingers, this time they were ready to receive an unexpected opportunity.
This time there was the right to a celebration, and there was the feeling that it had been earned. Pointing out that Saturday's final-day win over already-relegated Holstein Kiel perhaps salvaged the bare minimum – a top-four place – from this season would be to miss the point and to disregard the context. BVB had been languishing in 11th with just eight games to go, 10 points adrift of the Champions League places and with the prospect of any European football at all next season looking like a tough ask. If they had been able to take advantage of Freiburg and Eintracht Frankfurt (who began the day in fourth and third places respectively) playing each other on the final day, they had manufactured any luck of which they were the beneficiaries by winning seven and drawing one – away at Bayern – of the last eight, beating direct concurrents like Freiburg, Mainz and Borussia Mönchengladbach along the way, as well as winning at Leverkusen last week.
Little wonder, then, that Lars Ricken proclaimed Kovac steering the team home as 'already one of the greatest coaching achievements in the history of BVB,' acknowledging that it might be classed as hyperbole, even if there was the suspicion that his words were at least laced with the relief of a huge financial burden having been lifted. Meltdown has been avoided, even if the chance to rectify the mistakes of recent times must be taken and some big salaries could do with being shed.
Will it be enough to make Dortmund a serious Bundesliga force again? There is plenty of work to be done before anybody can start claiming that. Yet the fall of RB Leipzig underlines that today's Bundesliga high-flyer is tomorrow's crisis club – and how grateful BVB will be to be sending that latter tag out east. We already knew it wasn't a great season for Leipzig but there was something to be salvaged, even if the potential prize was not as great as what was waiting for Dortmund. They led too at half-time against Pokal finalists Stuttgart, but second-half by goals by Nick Woltemade (one of the season's surprise packages) and Ermedin Demirovic gave victory to Sebastian Hoeness and his men and left the home side without European qualification for the first time since promotion in 2016. Now there will be no active part in next year's Europa Conference League final at Red Bull Arena, and plenty of time to think about it this summer.
There will be recriminations over mistakes made in recent years, particularly in the transfer market where big money has been spent for little return. A lack of leadership is evident, with calls already for Jürgen Klopp to become more involved and help get the project back on track. Red Bull did not push into Germany's top flight to tread water but having finished second in that first season up, the club has not emerged as a genuine competitor to Bayern. This is perhaps where we find out if Klopp's appointment is symbol or substance.
With Bayern running rings around a Hoffenheim side trying desperately to stay away from the relegation playoff on Saturday (they were spared by Heidenheim's heavy home loss to Werder Bremen) despite batting back questions about the post-title team trip to Ibiza, the last week has felt as if maybe a return to the old order is where the Bundesliga is headed. What Leverkusen manage to do next will at least partly shape thinking around that, as will the destination of star turn Florian Wirtz, with many hoping he will end up at Manchester City or Liverpool after this week's flying visit to the north-west of England, in order to retain some semblance of competitive balance.
First things first; Die Werkself need a coach. Simon Rolfes implicitly denied reports from Italy last week that Cesc Fàbregas has already decided to stay at Como ('no candidate has turned us down during the entire process,' said the sporting director) but whether Xabi Alonso is replaced by his fellow former Spain international, Erik ten Hag or anyone else, it needs to be done quickly with a summer of change ahead. Jonathan Tah and Jeremie Frimpong are also headed out and a number of other players are waiting to hear what's next.
'It's important who the coach is and how he views my situation,' admitted Robert Andrich, one of the dressing room leaders, after the 2-2 draw at Mainz which saw Leverkusen complete 34 games undefeated away from home, an entire two seasons (they last lost away on the final day of 2022-23, at Bochum), underlining that they have something worth preserving.
If there is to be new blood shaking up the status quo in the upper reaches, the season climax wasn't the weekend when it was being announced. Seeing Freiburg fall down to the Europa League at the last was a tough watch, with centre-back Matthias Ginter one of those breaking down on the pitch at full time after the defeat to Eintracht Frankfurt. 'Perhaps the experience of the last two or three years will help us going forward,' Ginter suggested, though few would have really felt like that in the immediate aftermath, even if finishing fifth is an incredible achievement for Julian Schuster in the first season post-Christian Streich.
Credit must be given to Eintracht, a factory for selling big names in recent years and who lost another one in Omar Marmoush back in January. They recovered from going behind in the first half at Freiburg, having passed up match points to secure a Champions League berth on the last two weekends, keeping their nerve and prevailing 3-1, with on-loan Leeds full-back Rasmus Kristensen roving as per usual and scoring twice. The youngest team in the Bundesliga, with coach Dino Toppmöller having extended his contract this week, may now have room to grow.
Bayern and Dortmund can both go into summer with optimism, but both have shown in recent seasons that the Bundesliga's summit is a tricky tightrope to tread. The route to challenge is wide open.
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Augsburg 1-2 Union Berlin, Borussia Dortmund 3-0 Holstein Kiel, Freiburg 1-3 Eintracht Frankfurt, Heidenheim 1-4 Werder Bremen, Hoffenheim 0-4 Bayern Munich, Borussia Mönchengladbach 0-1 Wolfsburg, Mainz 2-2 Leverkusen, RB Leipzig 2-3 Stuttgart, St Pauli 0-2 Bochum.
Elversberg will face Heidenheim in the relegation playoff, aiming for a first-ever entry to the top flight having only reached the second tier for the first time in 2023. No such nerves, though, for Köln, who hammered Kaiserslautern 4-0 on the final day to clinch promotion and leapfrog already-promoted Hamburg to win the Bundesliga 2 title. Not bad for a team who sacked their sporting director and coach less than two weeks ago (71-year-old Friedhelm Funkel returned to win the last two games and seal the deal) and whose top scorer Tim Lemperle was injured in a street attack in the week.
Managerless Wolfsburg narrowly avoided being the worst team in the second half of the season by winning 1-0 at Gladbach, though the big news was the home side's Germany striker Tim Kleindienst sustaining a serious knee injury which will keep him out for months – and finish any chances of a big summer transfer.