Matchday Six: Putting your best foot too forward

By: Scott | September 20th, 2009

Some 30, 000 fans packed BayArena this Sunday afternoon, the greater share of them hoping to see a bit of history. Were they eager for any piece of history, they wouldn’t have been disappointed. But instead of being at the match in which Stefan Kießling set a Bundesliga record for scoring in each of a season’s first six, they only got to go home saying they were there when Leverkusen’s 72-match run without a 0-0 final came to its end.

With Werder Bremen paying a visit, today’s match was the first of this season that involved any real underlying rivalries. We last played Bremen in Berlin, when they took the Pokal final and crushed our last shot at playing in Europe this year. Adding to that bitter wound were the unspoken feuds on the pitch between Rolfes and Frings and Adler and Wiese, all vying for National Team respect. Instead of a full-on fight, though, it was a frustrating 90 minutes of both teams canceling one another out in the midfield and catching one another up in the offside trap, all punctuated by too many failed passes on our part.

For the visitors, the few shots-on posed little threat, save for one by Marko Marin in the 11th minute which Adler brilliantly kept clear. By Marin’s third effort, it almost looked like he thought his job was to get the ball to Rene rather than past him. For the Werkself’s part, despite starting both halves with strong offensive intentions, little came of their efforts and any good ideas they may have been hoping to create tended to be too easily taken away from them. Ultimately, our side found themselves mired in a defensive dance that, by the 60th minute, Bremen was clearly content to keep up until the music stopped.

The Werkself continued, when opportunity presented, to try to move the ball forward as best they could and Kießling did find the back of the net, but was called offside by this sexy bastard:

Not only did the linesman stymie Kießling’s 6-in-6 record, he also robbed Stefan of the day’s award for Most Ridiculous Facial Hair.

“Offside” remained a theme throughout, to the point that Arturro Vidal, finding himself alone and unmarked in Tim Wiese’s box with just minutes left on the clock, looked like he expected the flag to go up and only half-heartedly tried to lob the ball over the Bremen keeper. Renewed efforts by the squad proved fruitless and the whistle blew precisely on the 90th minute as Jupp Heynckes was trying to sub Thomas Zdebel onto the pitch. Both sides took a point back to the locker room but, having missed out on a Bundesliga record and the chance to take a two-point lead at the top of the table, it somehow felt like a loss. To me, at least. In post-match interviews, coaches and players on either side said they were happy enough with the draw.

A note on the Beard.

Kießling’s original terms and conditions on getting rid of the beard were somewhat oblique. He had been quoted in various places as saying that he wasn’t going to shave as long as he kept scoring, as long as Leverkusen keep winning or lest it provoke the Fates into delivering a Leverkusen loss. Today, after the match, he told the press “Now it’s coming off.” According to express.de, Kießling has already lathered, stropped and taken blade to cheek. Not the worst decision he could make, but I don’t think he gave enough thought to what that means to us here at The Offside. For now, I say we leave the Victory Beard going- and not just because I spent a good number of hours yesterday working on making it even niftier (a task I have yet to complete.) If you think it should come down, let me know. Until then, as we remain unbeaten, I will wipe Matchday 6 from the face of the Lord:

Next weekend the Werkself make the short trip to the wrong side of the Rhine to see our old pals at Köln, but before that we’ve got to get through the next Pokal round.

Wednesday Leverkusen face Kaiserslautern, who are riding on the jubilation of their steady climb up the 2. Bundesliga ladder. Anyone expecting the historied Red Devils to go down without a fight needs to brush up on their FCK lore. Back at you then…