Football Features

    Ibisevic’s 15-year record and other stats you might have missed from the Bundesliga’s return

    By Harry Edwards

    Bundesliga return: 12 stats you might have missed | Squawka

    Published: 15:20, 19 May 2020 | Updated: 12:19, 22 May 2020

    After what felt like eternity, the Bundesliga finally returned this weekend and treated football fans to three days of action.

    The Bundesliga was the first of Europe’s big five leagues to return from an enforced break, with six games taking place on Saturday afternoon.

    The headline clash was, of course, the Revierderby between Borussia Dortmund and Schalke at Signal Iduna Park, which the hosts won very comfortably to temporarily close the gap on Bayern Munich.

    Their fellow title chasers, RB Leipzig, didn’t have as much luck as they had to come from behind to earn a point against Freiburg, while Borussia Monchengladbach jumped into third with a win over Eintracht Frankfurt.

    Elsewhere, Hertha Berlin cruised to a 3-0 win against Hoffenheim, Wolfsburg left it late to beat Augsburg and Fortuna Dusseldorf vs Paderborn ended goalless.

    Sunday saw the return of the champions as Bayern Munich beat Union Berlin 2-0 and there was a 2-2 draw between FC Koln and Mainz 05, before Bayer Leverkusen added to Werder Bremen’s misery with a 4-1 away win on Monday.

    With so much football going on it can be hard to keep track of everything, no matter how many multiple screens you use. The goals are easy enough, but the deeper points of each game – and specifically the eye-catching stats – can dip under the radar.

    So, as always, here at Squawka we have rounded up the best stats from the Bundesliga’s highly-anticipated return.

    1. Erling Haaland becomes second-fastest player to score 10 Bundesliga goals

    Borussia Dortmund v Schalke is one of Germany’s fiercest rivalries and is a match for players of both teams to make a statement. One who hasn’t been afraid of doing that this season is Erling Haaland, and it was no different on Saturday.

    The Norwegian teenager opened the scoring at Signal Iduna Park, in doing so reaching 10 Bundesliga goals for Dortmund since joining from Red Bull Salzburg in January. Haaland’s goals came from just 13 shots on target in nine games, a remarkable record.

    But perhaps even more remarkably, Haaland’s 10 goals came in just 540 minutes. In Bundesliga history, only Paco Alcacer has reached that milestone in a shorter time of just 281 minutes, also for Dortmund.

    2. Double delight for Dortmund

    With Dortmund putting four goals past their rivals, there were bound to be more interesting stats outside of Haaland, including a pair of braces.

    The first came from Julian Brandt, who set up Dortmund’s second and third goals, recording two Bundesliga assists in a single game for the first time at Die Schwarzgelben.

    Raphael Guerreiro was on the receiving end of Brandt’s first assist, and rounded off the win with a fourth goal – scoring a brace in the Bundesliga for the first time at Dortmund.

    3. Manuel Gulde loves playing away from home

    Moving away from the Revierderby, Leipzig’s title hopes were struck a blow when Manuel Gulde opened the scoring for Freiburg with their first shot of the game – if you could even call it a shot.

    The faintest of flicks directed Vincenzo Grifo’s corner past Peter Gulacsi and saw Gulde end a 511-day goal drought, having last found the net in December 2018. But what was perhaps even more extraordinary was the fact it was only his third Bundesliga goal, all of which have come from set-pieces away from home.

    A less prolific German Roberto Firmino?

    4. Schalke make Bundesliga history

    The current situation in the world means that football has had to change, with one of the alterations being the number of substitutes allowed. In order to help deal with a congested fixture list, clubs were allowed to make five substitutions  in Bundesliga matches.

    Ten of the 18 teams took up that option over the weekend, but Schalke were the first to make all five substitutions – although it didn’t help them avoid humiliation by Dortmund.

    5. Vedad Ibisevic continues extraordinary goalscoring record

    Most eyes on Saturday afternoon will have been on the Revierderby, but Vedad Ibisevic did not want to waste any opportunity to extend his long-standing scoring record – even in front of so few eyes.

    Ibisevic scored Hertha Berlin’s second goal in their 3-0 win over Hoffenheim, his first stirke of 2020. It means the Bosnian striker has now scored a Bundesliga goal in every calendar year since 2006 (15 years in total), the only player to have achieved the feat.

    6. Plea’s early goal just misses out on history

    After a relatively slow start to the excitement on Saturday afternoon, Borussia Monchengladbach made sure fans didn’t have to wait too long in the evening kick-off.

    Gladbach took the lead after just 36 seconds through Alassane Plea, the club’s fastest Bundesliga goal of the season. But it was still too slow to break the their all-time Bundesliga record, which remains at 29 seconds, scored by Oscar Wendt against Dortmund in 2015.

    It is also still someway off the league record, at nine seconds, managed by both Kevin Volland (for Hoffenheim vs Bayern Munich in 2015/16) and Karim Bellarabi (for Bayer Leverkusen vs Dortmund in 2014/15).

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    7. Marco Rose’s revolution

    Marco Rose has received a lot of plaudits for his run as Borussia Monchengladbach manager, including from Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp, and it’s easy to see why.

    Gladbach’s 3-1 win over Eintracht on Saturday meant the club have won 52 points from their first 26 Bundesliga games under Rose – a club record.

    8. Uth shining away from Schalke

    Schalke may have been pulled apart by Dortmund, but at least one of their players had a weekend to remember.

    Mark Uth left the Royal Blues for FC Koln on loan in January and opened the scoring in their 2-2 draw with Mainz from an early penalty. It was the ninth goal he has directly been involved in for Koln in just eight games – having failed to contribute in eight games for Schalke in the first half of the season.

    Uth was also the first Koln player to be involved in at least one goal in eight consecutive Bundesliga games since Opta began collecting detailed data in 2004. Only Haaland (12),  Jadon Sancho (11) and Kai Havertz (10) have been directly involved in more Bundesliga goals in 2020 than Uth’s nine.

    9. ‘Lewangoalski’ still firing

    Before the break, Robert Lewandowski was in fine form, scoring four goals in three games across all competitions and he extending that run to five in four against Union Berlin.

    Scoring from the penalty spot, Lewandowski took his tally for the season to 40 goals across all competitions: 26 in the Bundesliga, 11 in the Champions League and three DFB-Pokal strikes.

    But while 40 goals in one season is enough for most strikers, Lewandowski has now achieved that feat in five consecutive campaigns. And he only needs four more to beat his best record during that run.

    10. Florian Wirtz usurps Havertz

    The Bundesliga weekend ended with Bayer Leverkusen’s trip to Werder Bremen and there was a record broken as soon as the game kicked off.

    Being named in the starting XI, and making it to kick-off, Florian Wirtz became Leverkusen’s youngest ever player in Bundesliga history aged 17 years and 15 days – breaking the previous club record of Kai Havertz (17 years, 126 days).

    Across the rest of the Bundesliga, only two players have appeared at a younger age than Wirtz, Nuri Sahin aged 16 and 335 days, and Yann Aurel Bisseck at 16 years and 362 days

    11. Havertz joins exclusive club

    But Havertz wasn’t going to let Monday night be all about Wirtz, scoring twice in Leverkusen’s 4-1 win. Scoring two headers in a single game for the first time in his career, Havertz also became just the third player to achieve that feat this season after Kevin Volland and Sebastian Andersson.

    12. Bayer Leverkusen, Crossing Kings

    A lot of Leverkusen’s threat against Werder Bremen came from crosses, with two of their four strikes coming from open play crosses.

    Peter Bosz’s side have now scored nine goals from crosses in the Bundesliga since the start of 2020, more than any other team. David Moyes would be proud.

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