A relegation battle in the French second division on a Tuesday night: Valenciennes hosted Nancy in early February to hoist themselves up from the relegation zone. The first half provided a spectacle while the second was rather low-key. Approaching the ground from the tram, the thin throng of people grew thicker the closer the grail…
Sometimes a good match comes along when you least expect it. It is one fixture that many have been looking forward to for several reasons: first against third of division three shown live on terrestrial television while Bundesliga 1 and 2 take a break. This is a dream set-up. The only downside are the restrictions…
Dixie Dörner was the best player of a country that no longer exists. This is not even half of what can be said about Hans-Jürgen „Dixie“ Dörner who has died on January 19, 2022 aged 71. From 1968 until his retirement in 1986 as a player he was the face of Dynamo Dresden and the…
Magdeburg supporters will be smiling this week as their team cemented the top spot in the table, going into the second leg of the season with 37 points from 17 games and a goal difference of +19. The latest game, away at TSV 1860 Munich however, had the aura of a farce. Not so much…
Since the second half of November 2021 Manchester United have caused all sorts of headlines for all the wrong reasons. The sacking Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was the latest chapter in the club’s history, a history that has been somewhat turbulent since Sir Alex Ferguson decided to retire in 2013. The parallels to the retirement of…
A short reflection on events three ago and the present: Jens Härtel was sacked after Magdeburg were defeated by Jahn Regensburg in November 2018; in 2021 Härtel beat them twice. It is almost three years ago to the day that Jens Härtel, Magdeburg’s most successful coach since 1990 had to go after his team lost…
Two years without a live match are a long time. Add to that some personal issues and it seems an eternity has passed. This game Red Star vs Le Mans demonstrates the end of the wait. It has been two years and two months that the last match report has been published here; a year…
With another corona winter just around the corner, football seems to have missed something. It is clear that Joshua Kimmich will be looked at differently since stating that he is not vaccinated yet, arguing worries about the consequences. This may be a fair point but does a huge disservice to football and more importantly, to…
The new season in the Europa League and Champions League is just a few days old and the centre stage besides the football was taken by violence. How has it come to this? A new wave of violence related to football fans rolled across Europe during the first encounters of this season’s Europa League competition.…
How important a player is, becomes apparent when he is missing. Magdeburg are learning this the hard way, losing two games in a row and looking very average in the process. It is late September and the third division in Germany has seen ten matches played so far, which equates to a quarter of the…