The women’s Bundesliga is back from the international break. And that also means: the fight for the Champions League places is entering the hot phase with five match days to go.
The women’s Bundesliga is slowly entering the home straight of its season, with only five match days left to play. While the championship title is unlikely to be taken away from Bayern Munich, the fight for third place and with it the chance of qualifying for the Champions League has long since broken out.
The focus of this final spurt is on TSG Hoffenheim and Eintracht Frankfurt, who are only separated by one point before matchday 18 and whose gap to the second-placed team from Wolfsburg appears to be too large. They are also joined by Bayer Leverkusen and SGS from Essen – at least theoretically, both could still make it to third place.
Eintracht Frankfurt has been warned
And so there will be a direct meeting between Frankfurt and Leverkusen this weekend. Both teams are separated by seven points, but Niko Arnautis is forewarned. Even in the first leg, his players couldn’t get past a draw. “Nevertheless, we dominated the game in the first half of the season and should have won. We have the quality, as we have proven again and again in the last few weeks, and can perform confidently,” said the Eintracht coach before the game.
Eintracht knows what it’s like to play with the big players. While the club failed to qualify last season, Frankfurt was only eliminated in the group phase of the Champions League this season. So it’s no wonder that the goal for the season is still to be part of the game again next year. However, Arnautis will have to do without top striker Laura Freigang on Saturday. The national player injured her shoulder in the DFB training camp.
Special game for Elisa Senß
On the other hand, it will be a special game for Bayer captain Elisa Senß. The 26-year-old will be moving to Frankfurt next season. But she still plays for Leverkusen. “We talked about it briefly. Elisa will give everything for us until the end. That’s how I know her as our captain, who always goes forward and doesn’t let up an inch,” is Leverkusen coach Robert de Pauw, who also left the club after the current season is left, convinced.
Leverkusen’s Elisa Senß (left) in a duel with Lisa Kolb from SC Freiburg.
The Leverkusen women have never made it into international business, but that is not their top priority. They would rather establish themselves in the front midfield; a place in the top five is the goal. Which is quite realistic this season, even if they don’t want to miss the small chance of qualifying for the Champions League. “As long as third place is still theoretically possible, we should do everything we can to achieve it,” says Thomas Eichin, who is also responsible for the Bayer women as director of licensing. “Of course we go into every game wanting to win. We’ll see where we end up.”
Hoffenheim is currently ahead
Hoffenheim currently has the best cards and wants to defend their third place against 1. FC Köln on Monday evening. Their opponents are in the middle of a relegation battle – unlike TSG, because they haven’t lost since the end of January 2024. And so it happens that Hoffenheim is completely on target. The goal for the season announced by current coach Stephan Lerch is to reach the Champions League.
The team from Sinsheim has already achieved this once. In the 2021/2022 season it was over in the group phase, but it was extremely close; in the end the goal difference decided. The 4-1 win against Arsenal FC was still remembered. Whether Theodoros Dedes, who will take over from Lerch next season, will be able to enjoy similar successes in the Champions League could finally be decided at the beginning of May. Then Hoffenheim and Frankfurt meet in a direct duel.
SGS food with minimal chance
If someone had told Markus Högner before the season that his team would be playing for the Champions League with five match days to go, the SGS Essen coach would probably have shaken his head in disbelief. And would probably still do it, because in third place there are at least ten points. At least mathematically, third place is not impossible for the only all-women team in the Bundesliga.
However, there are still a few chunks waiting for the Ruhrpottlers. While newly promoted Nuremberg is still possible this weekend, Essen first has to play against Champions League contenders Hoffenheim on the next matchday and against Bundesliga powerhouse Wolfsburg on the last matchday. There was a 9-0 defeat against the latter in the semi-finals of the DFB Cup.
2024-04-11 19:26:57
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