Bundesliga 17/18

[devo22]

Starting tomorrow. Hopefully going to be an interesting season!

As always, Bayern Munich are the clear favourites to win the title. They are aiming for six in a row, which would be a first for them. They've lost Lahm and Alonso to retirement and also sold Costa to Juventus, but brought in James, Tolisso, Süle and Rudy. Ancelotti has received his fair share of criticism during his first year in Munich and their pre-season was terrible, so there'll also be a bit of pressure to deliver.

Last season's runner-up RB Leipzig had a very steady offseason. They managed to hold on to star players like Keita and Forsberg despite crazy offers from other leagues, and they again primarily bought young players (their oldest summer addition is 23). The Champions League is obviously a first for them, and it will be interesting to see if they can cope with the additional games and a tighter schedule.

Borussia Dortmund have a now coach in Peter Bosz, who took Ajax to the EL final last season. Their pre-season has also been very rocky, and currently they are dealing with the fact that their star player Ousmane Dembele has gone on strike because he wants to move to Barcelona. It looks like the relationship between club and player is broken beyond repair, and I'd be very surprised if they kept him at this point. They've primarily bought from within the league: Toprak from Leverkusen, Dahoud from Gladbach, Philipp from Freiburg and Toljan from Hoffenheim (not official yet, but should be tomorrow or so).

Speaking of Hoffenheim, a repeat of their sensational season seems highly unlikely. They've lost key players Süle and Rudy to Bayern and now Toljan to Dortmund, and their incoming transfers have been pretty "meh". Their coach Julian Nagelsmann is fantastic and he'll surely guide them to a decent season, but I highly doubt they'll be in contention for top 5 again.

Some of the supposed big guns have new coaches ... and risky ones, too. Schalke have appointed 31 year old Domenico Tedesco, who previously worked as a youth coach at Hoffenheim and then saved Erzgebirge Aue from relegation in the second league. Leverkusen have appointed former star striker Heiko Herrlich, who coached in the third league last season and got promoted with Jahn Regensburg. Looks like those teams hope to find the "next Nagelsmann" ... we'll see if it pays off. Probably not.

Very happy to see "my" Bundesliga club return, as VfB Stuttgart won the title in league 2 after being relegated in 2016. They pulled off a major coup this summer with bringing in Bayerns technical director Michael Reschke as their new sporting director. They have also signed former Bayern defender Holger Badstuber and Leicester goalkeeper Ron-Robert Zieler this summer.

BAYERN MUNICH
+ James Rodriguez, Corentin Tolisso, Niklas Süle, Sebastian Rudy
- Philipp Lahm, Xabi Alonso, Douglas Costa, Holger Badstuber

RED BULL LEIPZIG
+ Jean-Kevin Augustin, Konrad Laimer, Bruma, Yvon Mvogo, Ibrahima Konate
- Davie Selke, Rani Khedira

BORUSSIA DORTMUND
+ Ömer Toprak, Mahmoud Dahoud, Jeremy Toljan, Maximilian Philipp, Dan-Axel Zagadou
- Ousmane Dembele (probably!), Matthias Ginter, Sven Bender, Mikel Merino, Adrian Ramos

TSG HOFFENHEIM
+ Serge Gnabry, Florian Grillitsch, Havard Nordtveit, Nico Schulz, Justin Hoogma, Robert Zulj
- Niklas Süle, Sebastian Rudy, Jeremy Toljan, Fabian Schär, Marco Terrazzino, Pirmin Schwegler

[M*A*S*H 4077]

As by a loss as losing Dembele would be, I feel Dortmund has a lot of depth that they would be ok. Reus, Pulisic (who looks ready to break out into a superstar imo), Phillipp, etc. are all more than capable of being major compliments to Aubameyang. Dahoud was a fantastic signing for them (although he has struggled to fit into the team so far with a short preseason). Now if Bosz can coach team defence they should improve over last year.

I remain really interested to see how James fits into the Bayern squad on a regular basis. Would love to see him alternate with Ribery/Robben to hopefully keep them all healthy and fresh. I'm also looking forward to watching Rudy continue to develop and I think he'll take a hold of that midfield leader role that they've been lacking for a few years now.

[SuperMatt18]

Munich up 2-0 already.

Each of their new players making a debut start has made an impact.

Sule, and Tolisso have scored. Rudy provided the assist on Sule's goal.

Rodriguez is still injured though.