Ready to shake things up

Two teams, one clear favourite. With SV Werder Bremen hosting FC Bayern München at the Weserstadion on Saturday, 14th February, almost everybody who knows a thing or two about German football will likely predict the same outcome for the 15:30 CET kick-off: three points for the league leaders to take back to Munich. The Green-Whites will be hoping to embrace their role as underdogs and turn things around to cause a huge upset against the record champions.

The latest squad news: Leonardo Bittencourt will be unavailable for the game against FCB, after examinations concluded that the midfielder suffered a strained muscle during Tuesday’s training session. Maximilian Wöber’s return will still take several weeks after a structural calf injury was diagnosed. Amos Pieper (minor procedure) and long-term absentees Mitchell Weiser (ACL tear) and Victor Boniface (knee surgery) will also miss out. Niklas Stark, however, has recovered from hip problems and is back in contention for Saturday. Head coach Daniel Thioune confirmed that every player fit enough to be involved could potentially make the starting XI, revealing that he won’t put out the “same line-up” and that “a lot will be different.”

Head coach Daniel Thioune on the opponent: "When FC Bayern are playing their best game, hardly any team in Europe has a chance at stopping them. You need to have enough luck, but most importantly, a sense of confidence in your own play in order to show what you’re capable of. It will be tough to stop them from doing what they want to do. It’s up to us to play our best game on the day. The lads have to go into every challenge like it’s personal if we want to match their level and have a chance of getting something out of them on the day.”

Bundesliga personified: SV Werder Bremen and FC Bayern München are gearing up for their 118th clash in the German top flight, with no two teams having faced off more often in the first division. Werder battled it out with Bayern at the top of German football until well into the late 2000s, although recent encounters between the sides have been more one-sided. FCB have come out on top in 26 of their last 28 meetings with Werder, having also been victorious in every one of their last 15 trips to the Weserstadion. Many of the current crop of Green-Whites, however, have tasted victory against the record champions, as SVW ran out 1-0 winners in Munich back in January 2024, thanks to a 59th-minute strike from Mitchell Weiser.

Welcome to the Weserstadion: After having made his debut in the Werder dugout during the game away at Freiburg, head coach Daniel Thioune is all set for his first home game in charge of the Green-Whites. The 51-year-old once faced FC Bayern in his playing career, as he and his former teammates at VfL Osnabrück suffered a 2-0 defeat to the record champions in the DFB-Pokal, although this weekend will be his first experience coaching a game against FCB.

Storming the league? FC Bayern have topped the Bundesliga table from the season’s very first match onwards, with the champions kicking off 2025/26 with a 6-0 home win against RB Leipzig and never having dropped below first place since. There’s a chance they could win their sixth German championship having led the league since matchday 1 all the way through to matchday 34 (68/69, 72/73, 84/85, 07/08, 12/13). On the other hand, only as recently as late January were FC Augsburg able to show that it’s certainly possible to get at Bayern, as they held on to secure a 2-1 victory at the Allianz Arena. Their first Bundesliga defeat of the campaign, the result confirmed that head coach Vincent Kompany’s side would have to wait another year to attempt to match Leverkusen’s unbeaten league record in the 2023/24 season.

The officials: Saturday’s match will be led by Bastian Dankert, marking his 183rd Bundesliga outing as referee. He will be assisted on the touchlines by René Rohde and Stefan Lupp. Felix Bickel will serve as the fourth official. Timo Gerach and Holger Henschel will oversee proceedings as the VAR officials for the game.