Training-ground good points: An obsessive coach with a watch for element, Xabi Alonso has taught his Leverkusen squad to play an thrilling, adaptable model of soccer. | Photo credit score: Getty Images
A well-recognized sight: Leverkusen has celebrated 34 objectives in its 11 Bundesliga video games up to now, a fee of scoring that places it on the right track for a 100-goal season. | Photo credit score: Getty Images
In soccer, nicknames usually stick — particularly the merciless ones, coined by rival followers.
Bayer Leverkusen supporters haven’t lived down an annoyingly apt nickname for a number of years: ‘Neverkusen’, due to all of the close to misses the North Rhine-Westphalia membership has endured through the 30 barren years since its final trophy, the 1992-93 DFB Pokal.
The most heartbreaking of the shut calls was the ‘treble that never was’ in 2002, runner-up finishes within the Bundesliga, DFB Pokal and UEFA Champions League. Given the opposite ‘nearly moments’, which included letting the league title slip from its grasp on the ultimate day of the 1999-2000 season, it’s no marvel that Leverkusen nonetheless bears deep psychological scars.
Dream starting
But the begin to 2023-24 has allowed Die Werkself followers to dream once more, because of what they’ve seen their group obtain beneath Xabi Alonso, a serial-winner as a participant, now turning heads in his first senior position as head coach.
Before the worldwide break, Leverkusen matched the very best ever begin to a Bundesliga season, with 31 out of 33 factors after a 4-0 win over Union Berlin in Gameweek 11. That equalled Bayern Munich’s file from 2015-16 — again when Alonso was an aesthetic midfielder enjoying for the German powerhouse beneath Pep Guardiola, who oversaw three profitable seasons at Munich.
Indeed, the one factors Leverkusen has dropped got here in a pulsating 2-2 draw at reigning champion Bayern’s residence — a consequence described as “fair” by gamers and coaches from each side.
“I think we played on the same level,” Alonso mentioned after the draw again in September. “We have shown personality. We have shown quality. We have shown mentality, and that’s the main thing to build on. There will come worse moments and that’s when we need to stick together.”
The “worse moments” haven’t but come. Leverkusen has received 16 of its 17 matches in all competitions, together with 12 video games in a row in Germany and internationally.
But whereas the followers have begun to consider that the membership can contend for the title, Alonso isn’t wanting too far forward, telling reporters “there’s no certainty about what will happen in May”.
“It’s going to be difficult before the winter break,” mentioned Alonso. “We’ve seen that before, a team plays a good first round but a bad second round, and then all expectations are gone. Hopefully all the players come back fit from the international break. The feeling is super at the moment.”
Drawing from expertise
Former Arsenal captain Granit Xhaka, now manning Leverkusen’s midfield, informed Sportbild that the “young side had the hunger to achieve something big” however reminded everybody that titles are usually not received within the season’s first half. That is an expertise Xhaka is aware of all too nicely: Arsenal was overtaken by Manchester City in direction of the top of the 2022-23 Premier League season.
It’s no shock that Alonso and his on-field lieutenant have struck a observe of warning. Bayern has dominated the Bundesliga, successful 11 titles in a row. Ending a monopoly just like the one Bayern has established requires many issues to go Leverkusen’s approach.
Besides, Die Werkself has been right here earlier than — as not too long ago as within the Peter Bosz period, Leverkusen went toe-to-toe with Bayern till the winter break however collapsed after that.
But this season feels totally different. And a big a part of that’s due to the kind of soccer the facet has performed in scoring 34 objectives in 11 Bundesliga video games. It’s a method that has confirmed profitable on the prime degree; apart from, it captures the creativeness, permitting followers to purchase into the journey.
Alonso’s Leverkusen traces up in a nominal 3-4-3, attacking with 5 and defending with 5 like lots of the elites do. It performs an thrilling model of soccer that’s adaptable: it dominates the ball with slick passing but additionally carries loads of venom in transitions and counter-attacks.
This season within the Bundesliga, Leverkusen ranks second for possession (58.6%) and leads in move accuracy (89%), however an actual measure of how dominant its play has been might be had from the truth that no facet has made extra passes within the opposition half (88.6% of three,904 tried).
A squad of younger, formidable gamers has been key to Leverkusen’s rise, with Alonso getting essentially the most out of the likes of German playmaker Florian Wirtz, speedy Dutch right-wingback Jeremie Frimpong and Nigerian striker Victor Boniface. The chemistry between the gamers within the close-knit squad has performed a task within the seamless soccer the facet performs.
Frimpong mentioned Alonso’s file as a participant at golf equipment similar to Liverpool, Real Madrid and Bayern, together with the Spanish nationwide group, is a strong inspiration. “You’ve got to respect him because he’s been there and done it. He’s won everything, the Champions League and the World Cup,” Frimpong mentioned.
Alonso has additionally ensured there are skilled heads to information the younger expertise on the pitch, with Lukas Hradecky in purpose, Xhaka within the midfield pivot and Alex Grimaldo at left-wingback.
Leverkusen has been shrewd within the switch market, guaranteeing the lack of winger Moussa Diaby to Aston Villa didn’t damage its goal-scoring prospects. But with as many as 5 gamers doubtlessly leaving for the Africa Cup of Nations within the new yr, Leverkusen, which doesn’t have the depth Bayern has, will discover the going tough. Alonso can even have to rotate his squad, given the calls for of enjoying in Europe as nicely, to handle the workload.
Spectacular turnaround
This is simply the newest in a sequence of challenges Alonso has confronted in his first job with a membership’s first group after working with reserve and youth squads in Spain. When he took the reins at Leverkusen in October 2022, the facet had slumped to seventeenth within the 18-team league. Alonso had just one win from his first seven video games in all competitions however turned it round spectacularly.
From guiding the facet to sixth within the Bundesliga and the semifinals of the Europa League in his first season in cost, Alonso has pushed Leverkusen to the summit of the German top-flight this season. Unsurprisingly, the membership acted shortly in August to tie him up till 2026, agreeing a two-year extension of his contract.
Equally unsurprisingly, Alonso’s early success has fuelled hypothesis within the Spanish media that he could possibly be a contender to take over at his outdated membership Real Madrid when Carlo Ancelotti’s contract runs out on the finish of the season.
That’s a transfer that appears inevitable sooner or later, however Leverkusen followers will fervently hope that Alonso’s younger chargers can have made the ‘Neverkusen’ nickname a factor of the previous by then.
Source: www.thehindu.com
