Champions League: Bundesliga Clubs Favourites to Advance
By: Jan | August 30th, 2007According to The Offside’s godfather Bob that is. The draw for the Champions League group stage took place today, before I could even get the chance to write about Werder Bremen’s unconvincing display against Dinamo Zagreb; which didn’t stop them from winning both legs of the tie anyway. Coach Thomas Schaaf nevertheless sees his side improving with every day and every victory, which would mean that they must have sucked even worse against Nuremberg last weekend. I’m admittedly overly harsh with them, but I miss the attacking flair of that Werder Bremen squad we saw last year. More importantly though, Ajax surprisingly lost to Sparta Prague and thus Bremen took Ajax’s place in Pot 2 of the draw, helping them avoid another group of death experience. Here are the groups with Bundesliga involvement:
Group B: Chelsea, Valencia, Schalke 04, Rosenborg
Group C: Real Madrid, Werder Bremen, Lazio, Olympiacos
Group E: Barcelona, Lyon, Stuttgart, Rangers
Inara over at the Lyon Offside already declared Group E to be this years The Group of Death(TM). Oh, and Isaiah who is running the Barcelona Offside thinks the exact same thing. Schalke fans might want to object to that notion I guess. For more reactions to Schalke’s group go to the Chelsea Offside and the Valencia Offside.
On paper Bremen probably got the easiest group and are thus favourites to advance of all Bundesliga clubs; assuming that they return to form in time for the group stages. For Schalke and Stuttgart I wouldn’t dare to make any predictions. I really have no clue how they measure up to Europe’s elite. But that’s what makes the Champions League all the more exciting and interesting to watch for me this season anyway – a bit like the box of chocolates from this Hollywood movie if you are keen on analogies.
Some Related Bundesliga Posts:
Category: Bundesliga
Comments
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How is Stuttgart’s form so far? Is it anything like it was for the last half of the season last year?
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No, their form is currently not anything like last season, where they won a record number of games in a row, but they shouldn’t have a hard time getting back on track. They kept their whole winning squad together and slightly strengthened the midfield and attack. Their pre-season was probably marred by too many injuries which caused some problems.
But it will be interesting too see, whether this young squad is ready to challenge established Champions League teams. I don’t know if there is any player with CL experience (probably Ewerthon or Bastürk who they bought this summer) and their coach has no international experience either. So that might or might not be an advantage for Lyon, Barcelona and Glasgow – I’m not sure this fact would really matter in the group stage though.
It’s worth pointing out that a couple of young players from their own academy (Tasci, Hilbert, Gomez and Khedira) already debuted or are about to debut for the German national team. There is a lot of potential in this team.
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