By Heiko Lütkehus
Just imagine! It is summer 2010 again, the new football season is about to begin and somebody wants you to foresee the upcoming Bundesliga season. Nobody would have said that giants FC Schalke, VFB Stuttgart and especially Bayern Munich could suffer from such enormous problems during the first half of the campaign. Even though some might have expected that the World Cup players could struggle to physically keep up with their opponents, most of them surely had no idea that the new campaign could be so extraordinary.
Youngster team Mainz 05 was said to be one of the relegation battlers this season. Now they are top of the league with 24 points in 9 games. They have managed to win their away games against the self-proclaimed title favorites Bayern Munich, Bayer Leverkusen, Werder Bremen and VFL Wolfsburg.
Nonetheless, the German representatives in European competitions are doing absolutely well. Due to this, the league will probably earn the opportunity to send four German teams into the 2012/2013 Champions League campaign.
Until then it will be exciting to follow the league. Obviously, there is no league in Europe with a comparable balance of quality. Undoubtedly, the top teams from Spain and England are still on a higher level. However, La Liga or the Premiership cannot offer a league fraught with tension and filled with young ambitious teams like the Bundesliga.
As long as young teams like Mainz 05 and Borussia Dortmund are able to dominate the campaign, the German football will remain on its way to success. In the course of the season, some of the top-teams will surely make demands to win back their top positions. Slow but steady it seems like struggling teams just as Werder Bremen and Bayern Munich can manage to increase their performances. The thrilling match between the old rivals on Tuesday in the German Cup competition delivered exactly what it had promised. That`s why football fans can expect a suspense-packed season with more goals than in the French league, more spectators than in the Italian Serie A and finally more tension than in La Liga and the Premiership.
It is impossible to predict the tendencies for the upcoming weeks and exactly that`s the reason why the Bundesliga is still on the increase.
