ESPN's lead German Bundesliga commentator Derek Rae tackles lots of hot topics in his everyday column. From a capability thriller this Saturday as RB Leipzig host Borussia Dortmund, one among their maximum fruitful cities to go to, (move LIVE, 1:30 p.M. ET, ESPN+) to the delights of unbeaten Freiburg, who face Bayern (flow LIVE, 10:30 a.M. ET, ESPN+). Plus why one coaching change would possibly have some other tactician sitting uncomfortably.
Leipzig and Dortmund pitched up the front and centre inside the Champions League for German football fanatics on Wednesday night in opposition to PSG and Ajax respectively. A return of simply one factor from the 2 matches changed into below what became truly required, but you can't legislate for an early Andre Silva missed penalty that might have given Jesse Marsch's team a 2-zero cushion towards an elite side, or a doubtful Mats Hummels red card for BVB that German commentators stay incredulous approximately.
Let's wish each golf equipment plan on saving a serving of hearty and unpredictable Bundesliga fare for Saturday evening in Germany. There is each risk, despite the fact that absolutely everyone with know-how of an admittedly brief head-to-head records knows, this is any other Angstgegner ("bogey team") scenario for Leipzig.
Dortmund have gained four aggressive encounters in a row in opposition to them, which include a four-1 triumph in final season's DFB-Pokal final in Berlin. You can pass further again and find a comparable story: six wins out of 7 for BVB. Leipzig's lone home win towards the Schwarzgelben arrived inside the first actual meeting of the two -- extra than five years in the past -- whilst all groups have been still identifying how to include RBL's strength and Gegenpressing style.
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Jesse Marsch's maiden season as a Bundesliga head educate has been a roller coaster as Leipzig were up one week and down the subsequent. Last week, at Eintracht Frankfurt, Tuta's remaining-gasp equaliser ruined the educate's dinner as he become ultimate in on his first Bundesliga victory towards fellow Euro representatives. As he later advised German outlet ZDF: "It's like a damaged report. We're now not sharp or regular sufficient in the front of intention and there are too many easy mistakes on the returned. We cannot yet say we're a pinnacle facet on this league."
Quite surely, Leipzig have struggled to put a whole overall performance collectively this season. It's all been in suits and starts offevolved, and there are the ones in the Bundesliga ex-player fraternity who aren't pretty sure approximately the change from in the main a "ball-manage" sport under Julian Nagelsmann lower back to the wilder, better-tempo style underneath Marsch that was the club's hallmark. Last week, Didier Hamann puzzled on TV whether it become proper to take gamers who've developed in soccer phrases and make them input a "time capsule" on this manner.
Somewhere alongside the road, Marsch and Leipzig need a win in opposition to a group on a level or better than them, and it's totally possible that it comes this weekend. As I wrote closing week, Dortmund are having to piece matters collectively recreation through game given the extended absence of the talismanic striker Erling Haaland. It's now not going to be best with out him, so it is a remember of locating a line leader for the day - whether Thorgan Hazard, Steffen Tigges or Marco Reus - or a combination of all 3 in a form of hybrid attacking system.
Will Dortmund hold to earnings at the pitch towards Leipzig, or is Saturday when RBL -- with their unbridled power -- change matters for the better?
The timing of occasions inside the beyond week or so has intended no longer having any scope to reside on Bayern's five-zero DFB-Pokal debacle in Gladbach. It was a historic night by any stretch of the creativeness, however commonly "Bayern-like" -- an expression in that specific English shape now broadly used in German -- became their reaction against Union Berlin away and Benfica at home in the Bundesliga and Champions League respectively.
