The Bundesliga is about so much more than its upper segment, and so it proved in a season that kept pulses racing to the end. Bayern Munich won the title with 7 games to go, a record in Europe’s top 5 leagues, but there was plenty to keep us interested.
Bayern’s majesty may have been predictable, but was no less exhilarating for it when they were at their best. If not for the ease-up immediately after the title confirmation – a draw and 2 defeats – Pep Guardiola’s side would clearly have beaten last season’s 91-point total. His signings were shrewd. Mario Götze’s addition yielded 10 goals and 8 assists in 20 starts, for a 7.68 average rating. Thiago Alcántara made a strong impression too (7.84 average, Bayern’s second highest), despite injury restricting him to 11 starts.
Yet the sole Bayern players in the WhoScored Bundesliga team of the season are Arjen Robben and Franck Ribéry, reflecting both the reliability of the pair but also the constant shift of central midfield personnel, with injuries and plentiful options. With an average rating of 8.2, Ribéry was the league’s player of the season. He started just 18 times but scored 10 and gave another 10 assists.
Bundesliga top scorer Robert Lewandowski (partnering Hoffenheim’s Roberto Firmino in our XI) will be added to the mix next season, of course, but there is the sense that Borussia Dortmund might be able to rebuild and cause Bayern more discomfort next season. Jürgen Klopp is likely to be able to retain the bulk of his side, with Mats Hummels and Henrikh Mkhitaryan (who scored 9 goals and made 10 assists) both in the WhoScored Bundesliga team of the season.
Mkhitaryan should improve even more in the next campaign, as should fellow arrival Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. His season rating of 7.02 was not significantly lower than in his final season at Saint Etienne (7.13), but that he was only BVB’s 14th best performing player is an indication of what a step up he has made in joining the Westphalian giants – and how much further he has to go to establish himself. Aubameyang made 21 starts, scored 13 goals and gave 4 assists. If these two continue to progress, the addition of Hertha Berlin’s Adrian Ramos (16 goals and 5 assists, 7.75 average) should give them formidable options.
Schalke and Leverkusen make up the top four, as might have been expected last summer (albeit not necessarily in that order). Yet the good news from a neutral perspective is that the potential gatecrashers to the top four are in great shape ahead of next time. Wolfsburg did everything they could to break in on the season’s final day, with their 3-1 over Borussia Mönchengladbach eventually in vain after Leverkusen held on to beat Werder.
Their efforts were reflected in 4 of their players making our team of the week; Ricardo Rodriguez, Robin Knoche, Ivan Perisic. Kevin De Bruyne. The outstanding Rodriguez (8.0 average) and centre-back Naldo also make the Bundesliga season XI. Incidentally, their final points total of 60 would have comfortably secured fourth place last season – Schalke confirmed the final Champions League spot on the last day of the previous campaign with 55.
Gladbach – who could have made fourth themselves on the final day had they won and Leverkusen lost - have already made plans for the next campaign, sealing the signings of attacking midfield pair André Hahn (Augsburg, 7.44) and Ibrahima Traoré (Stuttgart, 6.97). If Marc-André Ter Stegen, the WhoScored Bundesliga goalkeeper of the season (average rating 7.2) will be missed, coach Lucien Favre has moved quickly to assure the succession, signing the highly-rated fellow Swiss Yann Sommer as replacement.
If the race for fourth kept us occupied on the final day, the season’s theme has been the complete reversal in fortunes of a number of clubs. Hamburg are the most obvious example. Having narrowly missed out on a European place in 2012/13, they now enter a two-legged play-off with Greuther Fürth in an attempt to preserve their record of never having been relegated from the top flight. Mirko Slomka’s team finish the regular season on 27 points (21 less than in the previous campaign).
It could have been much worse without loan striker Pierre-Michel Lasogga, whose 13 goals in 18 starts replaced the 12 scored by the departed Son Heung-Min in the previous campaign. Hakan Calhanoglu’s emergence was also a bright spot. He has 11 goals and 4 assists from his first top-flight season, which he began as a teenager.
Hamburg’s problem is at the back. Five different central defensive combinations have spelt disaster, with the worst defence in the division having conceded 75 times, compared to 53 last season. Ultimately, only the parallel slip-ups of Eintracht Braunschweig and Nurnburg have got them this far. Having beaten fellow strugglers Stuttgart to give themselves hope in late March, Der Club lost all of their last 7 fixtures. Braunschweig, less surprisingly, lost their last 5 but ended up only 2 points shy of Hamburg.
More happily, Mainz are celebrating reaching the Europa League after finishing 6 places up on last season, with 11 more points than in 2012/13. Shinji Okazaki, the first Japanese player to score 15 in a Bundesliga season, was a big influence (scoring 29% of their goals).
Augsburg, meanwhile, are 7 places up on last campaign, with 19 more points. They even have a representative in WhoScored’s Bundesliga team of the season in Daniel Baier. This mobile midfielder was a model of consistency, making 3.5 tackles and 3.4 interceptions on average and playing every one of his team’s 34 matches.
They will miss Hahn (12 goals and 7 assists), though one of Augsburg’s strengths has been everybody chipping in. Halil Altintop struck 10 and Tobias Werner scored 9 (with the latter getting another 7 assists). Sascha Mölders, whose 10 goals last season effectively kept Augsburg afloat, scored just twice in 17 starts this time around, even if one of these was the goal that ended Bayern’s record unbeaten run.
Both must beware the example of Freiburg, for whom victory on last season’s final day against Schalke would have secured, improbably, a Champions League place at the Königsblauen’s expense. They spent most of this season battling against the drop after the departures of last season’s best two performers, Daniel Caligiuri (to Wolfsburg) and Max Kruse (Gladbach).
New arrivals Admir Mehmedi (12 goals and 4 assists) and Vladimir Darida (3 goals and 6 assists) both packed a punch, and both scored in the 3-0 win at Nurnburg in November – their first Bundesliga win of the season at the 11th attempt – that got the season up and running.
It was that sort of season; based on fine margins outside Bayern. If the pack just behind can up their game, 2014/15 could be even better.
Who would make your Bundesliga team of the season? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below
