Leverkusen's biggest issue this season is time itself

Xabi Alonso's team won the Bundesliga with a side full of seasoned pros. But this time around, many of those match-winners are beginning to look their age.

There was very little about Bayer Leverkusen’s performance on Saturday evening that made them look like a team capable of defending their Bundesliga title. Whether it was the clumsy marking that allowed Marvin Ducksch to place an unopposed header into the far corner for Werder Bremen’s first goal, the lazy pressing that encouraged Romano Schmid to curl home a winner in the dying moments, or the simple fact that Leverkusen allowed their hosts to equalise twice over the 90 minutes, Xabi Alonso’s team unquestionably embodied the one thing they managed to avoid being last season: entirely ordinary.

“The table means nothing to me - it’s October,” retorted the Leverkusen boss after the game, suggesting that the nine points his team had dropped from their first eight league games were somehow irrelevant. But this isn’t to say the Spaniard was content with what he’s seen from his side in recent months. “We want to be competitive,” Alonso added, referring to getting back to their style of play last season. “We have to feel that we can and must defend better. We create chances with the ball; we have a good flow, but we also need to have that same intensity and willingness to sacrifice in the Bundesliga, Champions League, and the cup. Without it, it’s not possible.”

It’s certainly too early to write off the reigning champions, who sit just five points off a Bayern Munich side that have already dropped points in the league and won only two of their last six games in all competitions. However, with each passing game, there’s a growing sense that this league campaign is slipping through Alonso’s fingers, as he comes to terms with the fact that his squad may simply not be capable of matching last season’s heroics. The reasons behind that may be entirely out of his control.