It is safe to say Bayer Leverkusen are currently the comeback kings of Europe. The home side defeated VfB Stuttgart 4-3 at the BayArena in an absolute thriller, just days after their late heroics against AS Roma.
At half-time the scores were tied at 0-0, the second half produced an intriguing outcome no one would have seen coming. 45 minutes yielded seven goals, starting in the 50th minute when Stuttgart’s Martin Harnik took advantage of some shambolic Leverkusen defending. Daniel Didavi added to the advantage just four minutes later, shell-shocking the hosts.
Leverkusen substitute Karim Bellarabi was on the field no longer than a minute before he sparked things up for his side to make it 2-1. Two minutes later Lukas Rupp cancelled out the Bellarabi goal by smashing home Stuttgart’s third.
By this point it seemed like Roger Schmidt and his Leverkusen side were going to succumb to yet another below par result. But the resilient Leverkusen stars had other ideas, scoring two goals in the 70th and 71st minutes through Sebastian Boenisch and Javier Hernandez. The Admir Mehmedi match-winner arrived in the 89th minute.
Leverkusen is now sixth in the Bundesliga, just one point adrift of the fourth-placed Wolfsburg.
Leverkusen dreadful in defence once again
In a defensive sense, this week has been a nightmare for Leverkusen, conceding four in their midweek European outing before conceding three against a 16th placed Stuttgart outfit.
Jonathan Tah, arguably Leverkusen’s most capable centre-half this season, started tremendously but he was caught out twice in the second half, one of those errors leading to an opposition goal.
After two defensive midfield experiments, Omer Toprak returned to his preferred centre-back role, replacing Kyriakos Papadopoulos. This change did not trigger the influence to prevent the three goals conceded however.
When the Leverkusen defence is analysed on paper, it indicates a rather young and solid one, especially given the exceptional form from youngsters Wendell and Tah, in addition to the credentials of Papadopoulos and Toprak.
However the defending was horrendous, every time the away team progressed to the final third it looked like Leverkusen were going to concede. Whatever the problem might be in the defence, it needs to be addressed immediately.
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