Timo Werner is rapid. As demonstrated in RB Leipzig’s 2-0 victory over Hamburg on Friday, the German international is a devastating one-man counter attack. Like Wayne Rooney in his pomp, Werner is unabashedly direct.
30-year-old wunderkind manager Julian Nagelsmann will earn the plaudits for masterminding Hoffenheim’s 2-0 victory over Bayern Munich on Saturday, but another precocious young individual has also made the headlines for his performance in the match: 13-year-old ball boy Umut Tohumcu, who was making his debut in the role.
Without a goal or an assist in Borussia Dortmund’s 2-0 win over Hertha Berlin on Saturday, Christian Pulisic mania wasn’t allowed to grip the nation. But a “quiet” week from the 18-year-old also allows us to dissect his performance in a more serious manner.
What the analysis reveals should obviously already be clear, but let’s just belabor the point: Pulisic isn’t a gimmick. He’s not the fevered creation of a nation starved of a world-class talent. He’s actually just really, really good.
RB Leipzig were already up 3-1 on SC Freiburg in the 80th minute when new boy Bruma did THIS:
GOLAZO ALERT!
RB Leipzig's Bruma scores an early contender for goal of the season. #Bundesliga #RBLSCF https://t.co/GnvFmnIaUY
Who knows, in another era (last year) or perhaps just another league (most likely La Liga), the referee somehow gets it in his head that Cologne’s Jhon Cordoba has committed a serious foul play here and red cards him. I mean, how else could you explain rugged Hamburg center back Kyriakos Papadopoulos screaming and rolling around like this? Obviously Cordoba has done something unspeakable, so send him off.
At 33 years of age, Bayern Munich must surely be contemplating how they’ll ever manage to replace Arjen Robben on the right wing. Robben gives the impression of having been around this game forever, and with good reason. The 2017-18 campaign will mark his 18th as a professional. The fact that he’s been bald for the majority of them and is permanently recovering from/suffering a muscle injury only adds to his distinguished agedness.
Guys, I think the Christian Pulisic secret is out. America's Great Hope scored a goal and collected an assist this weekend in Borussia Dortmund's 3-0 win over Wolfsburg, which was good enough to earn the 18-year-old Man of the Matchday honors for matchday one in the Bundesliga.
Pulisic is going to be hard for the rest of the world to ignore after scoring this:
Hey, so this is going well, don’t you think? To be honest, it's really going too well. Our Pulisic-O-Meter wasn't designed well enough to withstand this breakneck pace of USMNT wins in the Bundesliga.
After scoring against Bayern Munich in the German Super Cup to jump-start his 2017-18 season, Christian Pulisic opened his league campaign with a goal and an assist against Wolfsburg on Saturday.
After FIFA’s strangely inept trials of the Video Assistant Referee system at both the 2016 Club World Cup and 2017 Confederations Cup, it looks as though Germany will once again prove to be an ever-reliable fountainhead for efficiency and mastery, now with regards to using replay technology in football.
VAR decisions have been overly long, miscommunicated and occasionally downright baffling, but before the start of the new Bundesliga season, the German DFB made it clear that they didn't envision these issues plaguing their own use of the system.
The English Premier League, La Liga and Liga MX may be more popular in America than the Bundesliga, but the German league deserves your attention, this year more than ever. The Bundesliga is essentially a year-long World Cup primer.
The Bundesliga features everything that will decide the 2018 World Cup in Russia. If you want the knowledge to impress your friends when the rest of them decide to pay attention to soccer next summer, follow the Bundesliga this season.
Here’s what you should know about the 2017-18 Bundesliga season and, by extension, the 2018 World Cup.