The assessment of the 3-1 defeat at home to VfL Wolfsburg on kicker.de reads: "Bruno Labbadia beat his former club Bayer Leverkusen in the Bundesliga for the first time at the thirteenth attempt. As in the surprise victory against FC Schalke on matchday one, Labbadia's VfL Wolfsburg produced an impressive display at the BayArena to secure a 3-1 win with a brace scored halfway through the second 45. The Werkself threw away the lead from a strike by Bailey and remain pointless."
There is a similar view in the report in the online edition of the BILD: "Yesterday, the lead came first followed by the mistakes: Leon Bailey (21) scored with a curler for the opener on 24 minutes. Wofsburg's response: Gerhardt crossed from the byline and the Bayer keeper Özcan (34) punched the ball into his own net (36'). Unlucky: 'Anyone can make a mistake and I've made one too. But the way I've caught myself out, that's how everybody should do it. We lacked determination, ambition and sharpness.' That's right! Nothing went right for Leverkusen after the restart. A double whammy from Weghorst (55') and Steffen (60') sealed the away win for Wolfsburg."
The Rheinische Post headline reads 'Perfect false start from Bayer' and the paper identified the double blow at the start of the second half as the decisive phase of the game: "Weghorst headed Bruno Labbadia's team into a 2-1 lead on 55 minutes. The Werkself looked shaky after going behind. Just as Herrlich reorganised his defence, the Wolves scored the next goal. Renato Steffen exploited the completely disorganised defence of the hosts to make it 3-1 on 60 minutes… Herrlich then gave Paulinho his Bundesliga, and Isaac Kiese Thelin his home debut. The 26,247 fans at the BayArena waited in vain for a fight-back from the ambitious hosts. The game ended with a deserved 3-1 win for the visitors."
The Sonntags Express looks ahead and describes the difficult situation: "It's off to Munich next. And a third defeat threatens away to Bayern. 'We won't moan and look for excuses. We have to grit our teeth and look to turn it round," said Ramazan Özcan. The coach was also disappointed: 'Two defeats don't meet our expectations. No points is a difficult situation. It will be a tough challenge in Munich and we have to be more organised in defence."
Bayer 04 Leverkusen will have to manage without centre-back Edmond Tapsoba in the coming weeks. The Burkina Faso international returned to the Werkself from the Africa Cup of Nations in Morocco with a muscle injury.
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Bayer 04 face Hamburger SV for the first time in almost eight years. Although the Hanseatic city team are often below par on the road, they are regularly in top form in front of their own fans. In particular, 18-year-old shooting star Luka Vuskovic is proving to be a real bonus for Merlin Polzin's team, both in attack and defence. However, that should not scare the Werkself: Not only was the last defeat against the newly promoted team 17 games ago, but Kasper Hjulmand's players are in with a chance of securing their fifth win in six games against HSV. Today’s matchday news.
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Hamburger SV and Bayer 04 meet again in the Bundesliga for the first time in almost eight years. This Tuesday evening, 13 January (kick-off: 20:30 CET), the promoted team with impressive home form welcome the Werkself to the Volksparkstadion to round off the Hinrunde. The lowdown on our next opponents.
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The Werkself are away to Hamburg SV at the end of the Hinrunde in the 2025/26 Bundesliga campaign. The match at the newly promoted club is on Tuesday night, 13 January (kick-off: 20:30 CET). Ahead of the first encounter with HSV since 2018, Kasper Hjulmand spoke about the strengths of the opponents, lessons learnt from the home defeat against VfB Stuttgart and provided a squad update.
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