During the first nine rounds in the German championship, five clubs managed to “steer”, which hardly contributed to the hierarchy of the standings. And the first "English week" carried a clear hint of delimitation. After all, in nine days, three matches were to be played, after which in many respects it could become clear who was what.
Three options for the development of events seemed most realistic. The Bremen conveyor for the production of goals overwhelms the next three opponents and creates an excellent reserve for the future. The “musicians” take a fake note, and the “Bavaria” chasing them finally stops playing the fool and shuts up the columnists, who praised its competitors with might and main. But Schalke had the best chances for leadership, second only to Bavaria in terms of goals difference and held two out of three matches in their native walls.
The ball, about which Sepp Herberger * had long warned of the insidious sphericity, preferred a different scenario. Not long ago, blooming with lush colors, “Werder Bremen” began to slowly fade, taking only four points out of nine possible. The champion’s catch was identical. Schalke, although it got hold of seven points, could not get ahead of the one who simply won the match after match.
The new guest of the table spitz turned out to be not one of those powerful squads stuffed with veterans who are greedy for high salaries, but a donor club whose bet on the beardless pleiad and by no means unobvious summer gain is now a success.
... With the approach of the new season, pessimists were quite logically added to the ranks of Stuttgart fans. The looting of a promising young team that won silver four years ago, and the next season defeated Manchester United in the Champions League, was almost completed. Since then, coach Felix Magat and defender Philippe Lam have gone to Bayern, striker Kevin Kuranyi and other defense player Marcelo Bordon set off to seek happiness at Schalke, and midfielder Alexander Gleb and defender Andreas Hinkel moved to Arsenal and Sevilla respectively.
Matthias Zammer and Giovanni Trapattoni managed to visit the captain’s bridge during this time, but in the end the club stayed with Armin Wei. By seniority, he is a third person in the coaching staff, whose independent work experience is more or less noteworthy as a twofold rescue from the departure of the Rostov Hansa. The statement of Way as the head coach at the end of last season puzzled many, and the extension of his powers after the “non-European Cup” ninth place seemed to lead to a dead end. Moreover, the largest off-season purchases of the club were Ricardo Osorio and Pavel Pardo - players of the Mexican team, which never abounded with European-class performers.
The beginning of the season showed that the worst was not in vain. In the three starting rounds, the Stuttgart suffered two defeats, both at home. But in the next match, visiting the “Bremen”, the incredible happened. Stuttgart lost 0: 2, eventually won - 3: 2. But the main thing is that the ethnic Spaniard Mario Gomez scored the winning goal in the 87th minute. Since then, the striker of the German youth team chalked up six more goals (by the way, he scored the same amount for the entire last championship) - three of them turned out to be victorious, two more brought a draw to Stuttgart. In addition, he has five assists.
Not to say that Stuttgart demonstrates an outstanding game. The secret to success lies in the amazing realization of scoring chances. It is no coincidence that the team brought the win-win series to nine matches, and in the last four invariably won. The goals of the gifted sniper Gomez (last week he scored Alemannia and Hamburg) and the growing importance in the game of 19-year-old Sami Kedira and Serdar Tashi (who committed the defeat of Schalke in the ninth round) - the best illustration of what is in Stuttgart "Appeared talented youth. The newspaper Bild, a trendsetter on the German sports press market, has already reincarnated the old, Magat era, team nickname - "Die jungen Wilden" ("disgusting youth" or more stylish - "disgusting guys"), crossed out by the timelessness of recent years.
Fans of Stuttgart, this reverence, of course, like. Although they still have an unpleasant aftertaste from the six-month regency of Trapattoni, the Italian has something to thank for. In his last interview with Sport Bild magazine, Gomez admitted that Trap, who told him: “Guy, I worked with many great strikers, had confidence in front of the goal.” You can be the greatest. ” Given that among the Italian wards there were such mega-forwards as Jürgen Klinsmann and Gabriel Batistuta, perhaps he was cunning. However, the current game of Gomez convinces that Signor Giovanni did not believe in him in vain. In the coming weekend, this will make sure and “Bavaria”.
* Sepp Herberger - head coach of the German national team, who won the 1954 World Cup, the author of the famous aphorism: "The ball is round, and the game lasts 90 minutes."
Translation by Andrey KARNAUKHOV