500/1 to win the Bundesliga at the Start of the Season - Now at 50/1!

When the German Bundesliga starts, many roll their eyes due to the firm expectation that Bayern Munich will walk their way to yet another league title. Those that do have every right to, as the Bavarians won it for a tenth time in a row last season and a record 32nd time.

However, every dominance comes to an end, right? In the summer, Bayern Munich sold Robert Lewandowski to Barcelona for €45m, a transfer that sent shockwaves around world football, as the 34-year-old Polish striker had scored 344 goals and created 72 assists in 375 appearances for Bayern, seeing him widely regarded as the best striker in the world.

The lack of natural replacement for Lewandowski has left questions as to whether Bayern have made a huge mistake, as ultimately, Sadio Mane isn’t an out-and-out goalscoring number nine.

Mane has scored three times in seven league matches for Bayern, but, it is their recent run of four games without a win that has piled on the pressure towards Julian Nagelsmann. So far this campaign, Bayern have been held to 1-1 draws with Borussia Monchengladbach and Union Berlin, whilst only drawing 2-2 with Stuttgart, before falling to a shock 1-0 loss at Augsburg. The champions currently sit fifth in the standings.

At this time last season, Lewandowski had scored seven and created one assist in seven league games. In total, as a team, Bayern are nine goals worse off than last season’s tally. Perhaps the Pole’s penalty area presence provided opposition defenders with a fear factor unlike what we see now.

Of course, it is well known that Bayern do make quick and stern decisions when they see things going wrong, such as when they sacked Carlo Ancelotti back in September 2017, seeing him replaced by Jupp Heynckes for the remainder of the season. Could Nagelsmann face the same fate?

At present, the four sides that sit in front of Bayern in the table are Hoffenheim, Freiburg, Borussia Dortmund and Union Berlin, with the latter mentioned side five points above them having already drawn 1-1 with them.

What perhaps gives a sense of the unpredictability of the Bundesliga this year, is that RB Leipzig forward Christopher Nkunku is the favourite to finish as the division’s top scorer at 4/1 following his impressive tally of 20 goals and 15 assists last campaign. The Frenchman has started life this season by bagging four in seven games.

Without the likes of Lewandowski and Erling Haaland, the German top-flight looks like it could be as unpredictable as ever.

Union were only promoted to the top-flight back in the 2018/19 season via the play-offs. Since then, they have been superb, finishing 11th, 7th and 5th, qualifying for Europe in each of their last two seasons. Are they readying to take the next steps to the Champions League, and maybe even the Bundesliga title?

At the start of the season, they were priced at 500/1, following their 2-0 win over Wolfsburg at the weekend, Urs Fischer’s side are top after winning five and drawing two of their opening seven matches, seeing their price drop to 50/1.

Notably, since the reunification of Germany in October 1990, no side from the original East Germany has won the Bundesliga title. In recent seasons, RB Leipzig have looked the most likely to buck this trend, having won the DFB Pokal last campaign.

Whenever the Bundesliga starts, most people point towards Borussia Dortmund to be the main challengers to Bayern, they have had a decent start, accumulating 15 points from seven matches, winning five and losing two.

The Black and Yellows are priced at 1/1 to win the league without Bayern, whilst also being at 8/1 to win the Bundesliga as a whole for the first time since 2011/12. With Bayern faltering, perhaps Edin Terzic’s men will be able to capitalise on what looks like a tremendous opportunity to stop Bayern’s dominance.

Terzic’s side bought well in the summer, as they acquired Nicolas Sule, Nico Schlotterbeck, Salih Ozcan, Karim Adeyemi and Anthony Modeste to make a push to narrow the gap. Under the 39-year-old’s management, the Black and Yellows have a 63.4% win rate when including his caretaker spell in the 2020/21 season.

Freiburg have never won a Bundesliga title in their history, but, in recent years they have shown signs of significant improvement, with Christian Streich’s men finishing eighth, tenth and sixth.

The Breisgau-Brasilianers have a lot of talent amongst their squad, with the likes of Maximilian Eggstein, Nils Peterson, Mark Flekken, Mathis Ginter, Christian Gunter and more regularly featuring in their starting line-ups.

Having shown improvements in recent campaigns, Freiburg are priced at 2/1 for a top-four finish and are at 50/1 to win the title for the first time in their history.

Hoffenheim are the fourth and final team that have started the season in a better fashion than Bayern.

They are priced at 66/1 to win the Bundesliga for the first time in their history which would be a major shock having not finished in the top six since the 2019/20 season.

Andre Breitenreiter did, however, get the job after delivering a shock league title win for FC Zurich last season though. Could the 48-year-old German bring the magic to the Rhein-Neckar-Arena?

Like Freiburg, Hoffenheim do have some extremely talented individuals on their books, such as Ozan Kabak, Christoph Baumgartner, Angelino and Andrej Kramaric, hence why they are priced at 11/4 for a top-four finish.