The Bundesliga once again offered an exciting finish on the last day of the game! RB Leipzig made the Champions League qualification unnecessarily exciting, while Union Berlin even jumped to fifth place.
The European ranks at a glance:
Arminia 1-1 Leipzig
1:0 Serra (70.)
1:1 Orban (90.+3)
RB Leipzig sufficed a point at Arminia Bielefeld on the last day of the game to secure fourth place and the premier class. What looked like a mandatory task turned out to be hard work from Leipzig’s point of view. DSC even took the lead in the 70th minute through Serra – if Freiburg had won at the same time in Leverkusen, the Red Bulls would actually have been kicked out of the CL.
Willi Orban only redeemed his team in the 93rd minute and finally made the CL qualification for Leipzig clear with the 1:1.
Leverkusen 2:1 Freiburg
1:0 Alario (54.)
Haber 1:1 (88).
2:1 Palacios (90.+7)
Bayer 04 had already qualified for the CL, while Freiburg were hoping for a slip-up in Leipzig to qualify for the premier class. After Alario had given the hosts the lead, Haberer equalized shortly before the end for the Breisgau team – since Leipzig was still behind in the parallel game at the time, SCF was only missing a goal for historic success.
Accordingly, Freiburg threw everything forward – and conceded the 2-1 with the last action of the game when Palacios scored from the halfway line into the empty goal. Since RBL also scored at the same time, a threesome wouldn’t have helped anymore… So Leverkusen was able to give the outgoing Rudi Völler a nice farewell gift.
Union Berlin 3:2 Bochum
1:0 Prömel (5.)
2-0 Awoniyi (25′, penalty)
2: 1 inches (55th)
2: 2 Lions (79th)
3: 2 Awoniyi (88.)
What a season from Union Berlin! With the 3:2 victory over Bochum, Urs Fischer’s team climbed to fifth place – and ended the season just one point behind the CL ranks.
The Irons had everything under control in the first half and deservedly led 2-0 before VfL came back strongly. Awoniyi made the home win clear with the winning goal shortly before the end – and made sure that SC Freiburg was overtaken.
VfB Stuttgart 2:1 Cologne
1: 0 Kalajdzic (12th)
1:1 Modest (59.)
2:1 Endo (90.+2)
The Effzeh had already secured participation in the Conference League before the game – but they still toyed with reaching the more lucrative Europa League. However, this would have required a win in Stuttgart – and a blunder by Union Berlin. Neither came about, which is why the Cologne team ended the season in seventh place. Nevertheless, of course, a huge success for the Baumgart troupe.
The final table of international rankings:
- FC Bayern – 77 Pts
- BVB – 69 Pkt.
- Leverkusen – 64 Pkt.
- Leipzig – 58 pts.
- Union – 57 Pts
- Freiburg – 55 Pkt.
- Köln – 52 Pts
