The final whistle blows, and the dust settle on the previous ninety minutes. But the press soon wants to get the opinions from the Bundesliga trainers whether they have won, lost, or drawn. Here’s what they had to say following matchday 4.
Freiburg 1-0 Bochum
Christian Streich: “It was a difficult game. Bochum was highly motivated and strong in their challenges. You always have to be very careful with Riemann’s long balls. We didn’t get into the game well. Afterwards, we didn’t take advantage of many scoring opportunities.
“As long as it’s 1-0, a game is always open. We were lucky with Holtmann’s shots, which are insanely difficult to defend. It could have ended in a draw, but in the end, I think we deserved to win because of the number of chances we had.”
Thomas Reis: “Congratulations to Christian Streich and his squad. It’s hard to sit here now, of course. We were made to pay for our mistakes a lot last week. In contrast, a lot of the things we set out to do, we did very well today. It’s a shame that the game is decided by this one action where the video referee intervenes. For me, the penalty wasn’t a clear mistake.
“Both teams had many chances. We haven’t had as many chances as today in the past few games. I’m absolutely positive about our performance. If we continue to play in this way, we will definitely get the points we need.”
RB Leipzig 2-0 VfL Wolfsburg
Domenico Tedesco: “We played well, like in the previous games. But now the result was right. I thought that in Stuttgart we were at the maximum in terms of missed chances. But we surpassed that again today.
“Right from the start we wanted to be more compact. Wolfsburg aren’t that easy to press, so we wanted to take it a little easier. We suffered; you could see that today. We switched, went high. We also had periods of possession. You have to have everything in your repertoire – and that’s what we’re working on.
“Christo (Nkunku) is very ambitious in training and wants to do everything perfectly. He demands a lot from himself, but also from his teammates. He does it very, very well. We want the players to coach each other. If he continues like this, he will take the next step in his development.”
Nico Kovac: “Leipzig deserved to win. After just a couple of minutes we conceded a penalty – which was rightly given – and that threw us off course a little. Leipzig dominated after that. We were much improved in the second half and had a few chances to score. We’re just lacking that bit of luck at the moment, but we made too many individual mistakes towards the end.
“We gave possession away far too easily without Leipzig really putting us under a great deal of pressure. It’s not what we wanted but it’s what we got, so we’re not satisfied.”
Mainz 0-3 Bayer Leverkusen
Bo Svensson: “The key was the first half. We had a couple of good chances and Leverkusen took the lead by a bit of chance. After that we lose our heads and concede two goals that Leverkusen don’t have to do much for. I didn’t like the style of play even before we conceded the first goal, we were really bad with the ball.”
Gerardo Seoane: “We managed to show a different face, to show a different energy. The game started well for us. We then managed to defend compactly and didn’t allow much depth, and we were also able to switch quickly. We have to try to increase our self-confidence through the positive result.”
Hertha Berlin 0-1 Borussia Dortmund
Sandro Schwarz: “Right at the beginning of the game we had our chance to score with Jonjoe Kenny, which Gregor Kobel saves very well. Then we weren’t that good in the game, we had a lot of easy turnovers. We gave the opponent chances to score with their quality. In the second half it was an open fight.”
Edin Terzic: “It was definitely important to show an improvement today compared to what we did last week. We managed that. I think it was a deserved win, there were a lot of things which were significantly better. However, we didn’t manage to close the sack, so the game was open to the end.”
Hoffenheim 1-0 Augsburg
Andre Breitenreiter: “It was a well-earned win in my eyes and as expected a difficult game – a game where mentality is key because we know that this sets Augsburg apart. It is important to assert yourself in one-on-one situations and to win your tackles.
“We didn’t give away any clear-cut chances apart from a corner that passed through our penalty area. I would have liked us to have scored a second in order to guarantee the win.”
Enrico Maaßen: “It was a tight game, and the stats reflect that. Hoffenheim created better quality chances and therefore deserved their win. We had plenty of good moments of our own, but simply lost the ball too many times in the last half an hour.
“In addition, we weren’t very focused going forwards and left ourselves exposed on the counter. We’ve got to be more determined in that respect. We will keep positive, identify the steps we need to take, and put them into place going forward to win matches.”
Schalke 1-6 Union Berlin
Frank Kramer: “This defeat is very painful. The scoreline for one, but also how it came about. We have to defend and assert ourselves better – in front of both our own goal and theirs. We had some good chances in the first half, but we conceded too easily.
“We drew up our plans after the restart – we wanted to score a quick goal, but that quickly changed 20 seconds in. Union’s goal to make it 4-1 ultimately ended it. We let in two more at the end, which of course should not have happened. We have seen how much physicality you need in the Bundesliga, and we’ve got to do that better in Stuttgart.”
Urs Fischer: “Schalke were better in the first half of the match, and our 3-1 half-time was actually quite lucky. They were more aggressive, more agile and we on the other hand seemed sleepy and sluggish. But we were very efficient. That efficiency, combined with our strength on the counter, is currently giving us the edge.
“Of course, when you make it 4-1 just after the restart then the game is only going to end one way, and in the end, it was too big a scoreline over 90 minutes. The fact that we are high up the table after four games will be a nice boost for some, but I’m only interested in the table after matchday 34.”
Bayern Munich 1-1 Borussia Mönchengladbach
Julian Nagelsmann: “I was annoyed because we played very well. I can’t blame the team, it’s just that we didn’t take our chances well. We played very well, had good control. We should have been 2-0 or 3-0 up by the 40th minute and then we made a mistake. Still, it was our best game of the season so far.
“As always, Yann Sommer played excellently against us. But on one or two occasions, we could have made it so that he can no longer hold the ball. We had 33, 34 shots on goal. I was also annoyed with the referee: He refereed every 50:50 situation for Gladbach.”
Daniel Farke: “It’s definitely a solid point for us tonight. Normally, you’re disappointed to concede a late equaliser. However, tonight you can’t say that Bayern didn’t deserve a point. We played with a lot of passion and delivered a great team performance, plus we were solid in defence and showed how resilient we can be. We wanted to have a lot of possession, but were a bit sloppy when it came to creating chances in the first half. If that hadn’t been the case, then we would have been able to create a lot more for ourselves.
“Bayern really upped the pressure after the break. It wasn’t easy for us tonight, but my team displayed an incredible fighting spirit, so hats off to them. It was a world-class performance from Yann Sommer tonight. That’s exactly what you need in order to take points away at Bayern München. Together with Manuel Neuer, Yann is one of the best goalkeepers in the Bundesliga, as well as internationally. We’re very glad to have him as our number 1.”
Köln 0-0 VfB Stuttgart
Steffen Baumgart: “We didn’t get into the game well, Stuttgart had the better chances from the start. We controlled the game better later on, but we still had hardly any convincing chances. Today it was a lucky point for us, over 90 minutes Stuttgart was better. Our plan didn’t work out, that had a lot to do with the opponent.”
Pellegrino Matarazzo: “We started the game very well but unfortunately we weren’t able to take advantage of one of our several good chances and go in front. Overall I have to give credit to my team for the way they competed after going down to 10 men and even continued to create scoring opportunities. All in all, we’re happy ”
Werder Bremen 3-4 Eintracht Frankfurt
Ole Werner: “Congratulations to Frankfurt on a well-deserved victory. We lacked compactness for 60 minutes, despite being in the lead at times. What I have to give my team credit for is the last half an hour. Despite the deficit, we were able to pose problems for Frankfurt. I’m positive that we know what we can work on.”
Oliver Glasner:“A big compliment to the boys today for how they played. An absolute top performance. From the first second we had a grip and then took the lead. It was great that we didn’t lose faith after falling behind. We are now used to the obligatory VAR decisions against us. Perhaps we’ll build them into our planning in the future.”
