Knauff, Brandt, Alonso: The Bundesliga eleven of the matchday
Daniel Svensson . It's crazy. BVB has been searching for years for consistency on the left wing and in their game in general. And then along comes a Scandinavian who still has to prove he wasn't the boy from the rusk wrapper in his first life, and suddenly establishes himself as a no-name. One goal in the home win against Gladbach, now two assists at Hoffenheim. "Had av," as the Swede says.
Robin Koch is poised to become Dortmund's next promising signing this summer, and his performance against Leipzig certainly justified BVB's interest. Or in other words: Let him cook (you get it, because of his name, cough). He just has to be careful that, as is only fitting for a promising Dortmund signing, it doesn't turn out "cooked" after just one month. Oh well.
Julian Brandt BVB's second most important blond player. With his volley in Hoffenheim, he showed once again that he can do more than lose challenges, stumble over simple balls, and play through balls into the opponent's feet. Because if you believe the BVB fans, Brandt hasn't done anything else in the last few months anyway. If you believe the BVB fans, however, their club has also been on the verge of total abandonment twice in the last few months, the squad only has better district league players, and Niko Kovac is an army general in a football coach's suit.Or as Julian Brandt himself summed it up on Instagram : "🤐".
Ansgar Knauff. It was a struggle for over 900 minutes, but then Ansgar found the doorknob. He scored twice, bringing his Eintracht Frankfurt a big step closer to the Champions League. And many interested football fans must have wondered when they saw his two goals: Huh? Ansgar Knauff scores? In the Bundesliga?! Because the man can really only score dream goals in important European matches. Greetings to Barcelona. And to West Ham. And to Besiktas.
Hugo Ekitike Sure, you'd only see as many Frankfurt fans as there were in this week's 11th matchday on an average Thursday at the Camp Nou. But what can we say? A landslide victory against the Austrian soda manufacturer (with an offshoot in Leipzig) makes us weak. In other words: Open the champagne! Or the Hugo.
Eibner press photo / Florian Wiegand / Eibner / IMAGO
Kevin Müller: The best Müller this weekend comes from Heidenheim. That's only because a certain T. Müller from the greater Munich area wasn't allowed in front of the microphones, but it still counts.
Leroy Sané put such a damper on Mainz's sporting ambitions that he was like an 11FREUNDE editor writing a report about the Rhineland-Palatinate team's success at the end of March, putting the 11FREUNDE curse on that same team until they stopped winning a single game. We don't want to suggest that Leroy Sané is in cahoots with our deputy editor-in-chief, Tim Jürgens, but, well, it doesn't seem like a coincidence that Bayern, especially Sané, took Mainz 05 apart so badly.
Shuto Machino: One for the obvious wordplay. And – as he demonstrated on Saturday against Mönchengladbach – one for the two-for-one Lieferando deals. In other words, the doubles of the important kind.
The relegation battle. The fight for survival in the top division deserves a mention here simply because it's the only aspect of this sleep-deprived season that seems even remotely exciting. Or so you think. Until you take a look at the second division and realize: They don't even want to be promoted. Perhaps Kiel, Bochum, Heidenheim, and the like are allowed to stay in the Bundesliga for that reason alone. Congratulations!
Ulli Potofski & Xabi Alonso The amount of questions Xabi Alonso has to put up with these days: Is he leaving? Is he staying? What's happening with Real Madrid now? Why has the season been so messed up? So it was nice that Gelsenkirchen native, Schalke supporter and veteran reporter Ulli Potofski brought some variety to the game. And after ticking off the standard questions, Xabi Alonso gave the following hint: "If all that doesn't work out, they're still looking for a coach at Schalke." And Xabi? He only understood Spanish. "I had no idea," said the coach. And Potowski replied: "You don't need to have any idea for that." Black humor or deep bitterness from the self-confessed S04 fan? Our storm of laughter was completely indifferent.
The Doppelpass editorial team . Because they managed to get Markus Babbel, Didi Hamann, AND Stefan Effenberg on a talk show at the same time. And there were no reactionary platitudes about Antonio Rüdiger, right? There was no lamenting that Effe had already been kicked out of the national team for giving the finger, was there? With so much concentrated ex-professional smoker's lung power, one can certainly congratulate them. And send a shout-out of solidarity to Mario Basler. Did he feel left out?
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