The never seen before was consummated in Leverkusen. The Bundesliga, that 18-team competition where Bayern Munich always won, changed hands after eleven years of Bavarian dictatorship. Xabi Alonso's Bayer was crowned this Sunday after beating Werder Bremen. The Bay Arena team achieves the first league title in its history and does so as the team of the year. A team that in the championship has 29 games without losing (25 wins), an absolute record in the tournament. A team that takes the salad bowl with five games left and with a 16-point advantage over Bayern.
A capital work that has been in the making all year and that presents immense numbers. With their victory against Werder, Alonso's team has gone 43 games unbeaten in all competitions, equaling a record set by Juventus in 2012. Because if they already have the Bundesliga in their bag, they are now going for the Europa League (defending on Thursday a 2-0 in the first leg of the quarterfinals against West Ham) and will play the Cup final against Kaiserslautern as a big favorite, since their rival goes through second place with more pain than glory.
Who was going to tell the long-suffering Leverkusen fans when their team was in relegation positions in October 2022, when Bayern. In just over a year and a half, the Basque has woven a structure that no one has been able to counteract this season. Without huge stars in the squad but forming an indestructible group. In the Bundesliga, up to 16 different players have scored, with the Nigerian Boniface being the top scorer, with 11 goals, despite missing four months due to injury. Against Werder he returned to the starting lineup to open the victory with a penalty goal (25). It fell under its own weight, within an almost total dominance of Bayer, an example of a team that plays short and is patient. Boniface himself, Hofmann and Adli were able to increase the lead before the break. Swiss Granit Xhaka (60) did it after the interval with a great shot from outside the area.
Alonso, thinking about Europe, had left three key men on the bench such as the talented Wirtz, who scored the third (67), the fourth (81) and the fifth (90), and the wingers Frimpong and Alejandro Grimaldo. The ex-Blaugrana has been fundamental throughout the exercise, although he is not the only Spaniard in the squad. The other is Borja Iglesias, who landed in the winter market.
Never again will the aspirin team be talked about like Neverkusen because after five runners-up finishes they already know what it is to taste a Bundesliga. It is only the fourth title in its history (it already had a Cup, a Super Cup and the UEFA that it won against Espanyol in 1988).
Leverkusen, a small city of 161,000 inhabitants, has become the new Gaul of international football. The invasion of the field by the public was inevitable and clamorous. Euphoria unleashed
