It’s a strange thing that Stuttgart generally perform better against opponents that are at their level of football, but struggle against teams that actually shouldn’t be a problem. Maybe they’re underestimating the opponent, or it’s the difficulty to finish when the smaller team play with nine guys in their defence and one striker, I don’t know.

But fact is, the newly promoted team had promised to “play along” and they did, indeed.

Stuttgart played, compared to Thursday, with four changes: Hitzlsperger, Pardo, Boka and Delpierre came for Khedira, Bastürk, Lanig and Magnin. While one can’t necessarily blame it on the changes, fact is that there was a whole different team on the pitch.

The match started with two teams on par with each other, and both soon had their first chances: First Gomez had a very good opportunity to score in the eighth minute and only Gladbach’s Brouwers kept them from receiving an early goal, then striker Rob Friend found himself in a one vs. one with Lehmann, who showed an amazing reflex in diving down and touching the ball with the finger tips of one hand, making it miss the goal by only a few meters.

After a throw in at the height of Stuttgart’s penalty area, Gladbach’s captain Rösler had to leave the pitch for the treatment of a laceration under the left eye, apparently caused when Pardo’s elbow (who didn’t even see Rösler) hit him when they both jumped up for the ball.

Anyway, Stuttgart used the advantage of being in superior number when Ricardo Osorio focused the attention of four Gladbach players on himself, still managed to dribble past the midline and passed to Thomas Hitzlsperger, who scored the beautiful 1:0 from 25 metres away. It was one of those goals that make every TV commentator mention that back when he was playing for Aston Villa, he was nicknamed “the Hammer”, leaving keeper Heimeroth no chance.

Lehmann showed another great parade when Matmour, after some confusion in Stuttgart’s defence, had the chance to shoot on the goal without anyone holding him back. Nevertheless, Stuttgart was the more active and aggressive team and had quite a few good chances, for example when Jaures lost the ball to Jan Simak. Stuttgart’s midfielder passed it back to Marica, who had no problem scoring the 2:0 - after he missed the goal four minutes earlier from a similar position.

But Gladbach were close to scoring, too, especially when Lehmann ran out of the goal but couldn’t get the ball away from Friend, whose shot, in the second attempt, could only be cleared by Arthur Boka with a great deal of luck. Who knows if Stuttgart would’ve recovered from that goal.
But Stuttgart are still best when they play against an equally forward-minded team: in the 44th minute, Gladbach was far into Stuttgart’s half, when they lost the ball, and Mario Gomez took the chance of the fast counter-attack, tricking defender Brouwers, and scored the 3:0.

The first interesting scene in the second half was one for Gladbach, again, when Rob Friend again was left alone in front of the goal - the defence’s focus was on Marin - but Lehmann was able to defuse the situation without too much trouble.

All in all, Gladbach were having a better second half of the match, as illustrated by the higher amount of goal chances, while Stuttgart leaned back and tried to keep the score. First Boka had to clear the ball on the goal line for the second time in the match, but the following throw-in was quickly turned to the 3:1 final score by Rob Friend, who had been sorely neglected by the Stuttgart defence, and that not for the first time in that match.

The defending wasn’t too bad in general, though there were a few points where one could clearly see that they had to get used to the line up and though he surely didn’t play his best season last year, Fernando Meira left a gap that’s difficult to close, especially when his “replacement” Boulahrouz is injured as well.

One of the best moments for Gladbach was when Marin dribbled past Pardo and Tasci and only missed the goal by not even a metre. The goal had motivated the players again, and so Stuttgart weren’t having quite as much of an easy time as one could have expected after the first half - though one has to say that at least they didn’t stop playing after conceding one, a habit that the team occasionally has.

To sum it up, it was quite an interesting match with good chances for both teams, but with Stuttgart being a tad faster, more motivated and, as a consequence, luckier. The strikers seem to be in good shape, even though some of the chances could have been used better, the team seems eager to show a better performance than last year; only the defence is in need of some fine-tuning. But it might look completely different when Boulahrouz is fit to play again.

Ten players left Stuttgart for the various national team matches on Wednesday - Serdar Tasci is hoping to play his first match in the German national team’s jersey.

The next match against Bayer Leverkusen is next Saturday. Let’s hope the players don’t bring any injuries back home and that Boulah finally gets the chance to celebrate his comeback to the Bundesliga.

What seemed like a success at first sight, namely reaching the last round of UEFA Cup qualification, has taken a high price: Despite even bringing an own chef to the away match against Georgian club FC Zestafoni, twelve players got infected with the rotavirus.

Györ even had to cancel their last match in the Hungarian league against TE Kecskemeti. As this is not possible in the qualification for European competition, the club will have to rely on reserves and youth team players to get through the match.

Stuttgart, on the other hand, can rely on a great part of the players. Cacau is having problems with the adductors, Khalid Boulahrouz’ ankle still isn’t quite as stable as it should, but apart from them, the team is in good shape.

Thanks to playing in three competitions, Veh is forced to a certain rotation: Pavel Pardo and Thomas Hitzlsperger are going to have a break today, they’re going to be replaced by Sami Khedira and Jan Simak. So we’ll have Lehmann in goal, Osorio, Delpierre, Tasci and Magnin in the defence, Lanig, Bastürk, Khedira and Simak as midfielders and Gomez and Marica as strikers.

I’m extremely curious how the midfield is going to look like with three very creative players who surely are going to push forward a lot, and if Khedira is going to be able to manage the defensive part all on his own, especially as I don’t think they have played together in that line up before.

As for the captaincy, I supposed Pardo would be the first choice to take the armband when Hitzlsperger isn’t playing, but as he’s going to start on the bench as well, I’m not quite sure. Delpierre has captained the team in a few test matches, but is in general seen as “too quiet”. It’s also possible that Lehmann is going to captain the team.

With the opponent being weakened and the VfB being eager to play on the European stage this season, I suppose chances aren’t too bad, and I hope that Stuttgart will be successful in the match, and that the players don’t catch that virus, too.

The match in the Mercedes Benz Arena (typing that name doesn’t get any easier with time) starts today at 18:30. The second leg is sceduled for 14. August at 20:30.

So I figured it’s time to have a look at the team and the possible starting line-up, though, as Armin Veh says, the only player with starting place guarantee is Jens Lehmann.

Goalkeepers: The question for the second goalkeeper is not that easily answered: 20 year old Sven Ulreich had the chance to prove himself in a couple of league matches last season, but Alexander Stolz currently seems to be ahead of him thanks to good training performances, as he was given the opportunity to play in both UI-Cup matches. The question who’s next is insignificant, though, as hopefully Lehmann is going to play for the whole season, and the goalkeeper discussion should be put to rest until next year.

Defence: Here Matthieu Delpierre seems to be set as a fullback. The other place in the central defence should go to either Khalid Boulahrouz or Serdar Tasci. Both of them are also able to play as a right back, but prefer the other position. I have to admit I’ve always been sceptical about Tasci and Delpierre playing together, but at least the Arsenal test match proved me wrong there. In the same match, Boulah also showed that he definitely is an alternative for the right defence, which he also played during the Euro, if I remember that correctly, though he actually sees himself as a fullback.
On the right side, he’d have to compete with Ricardo Osorio, who is the only ‘actual’ right back Stuttgart have at the moment (let’s hope Hilbert won’t have to jump in at that position again, he’s much better off at a more offensive position).
On the left side, we have a competition between Ludovic Magnin and Arthur Boka, which is more or less at eye level, as both players switch between great and abysmal performances (replace ‘Hilbert’ with Hitzlsperger and that’s exactly what I have to say about him as a leftback. It’s not something I want to see ever again, and I hope Jogi Löw has understood this, as well).

And then there are Marco Pischorn, currently injured, and Robin Schuster, actually listed for the second team but with a few performances for the A-squad, both young fullbacks who should be introduced to the first term on a mid-to-long-term basis.

Midfield: The ideal midfield line-up would probably include Pardo as the defensive midfielder, Hilbert on right, our new captain Hitzlsperger on the left wing and either Jan Simak or Yildiray Bastürk as the ten. Sami Khedira is a player for every midfield position and I hope he’ll get a few opportunities to prove his versatility this season.

As Bastürk was injured and Simak had a ban to serve, Martin Lanig already got a chance to prove that “the best player of the second league last season”, as the stadium announcer of Stuttgart called him, has the ability to replace either of them in the offensive midfield. The major competition will be Bastürk vs. Simak, though. Bastürk, who came last season and left Antonio da Silva no chance, might now find himself replaced by a new arrival. Both are good players, though Bastürk didn’t live up to his claim of being named next to the three great technical geniuses of the Bundesliga’s last season, Ribery, Diego and van der Vaart.

Still, he’s a player who is always good for some creative ideas in the attack, with his biggest flaw being that he loses the ball to often. Simak, on the other hand, may not be quite as creative, but guarantees for a more solid performance. Plus, he’s a guarantee for free kicks, something Stuttgart have sorely lacked the past years, despite Hitzlsperger’s ability with long-range shots.

Two talents to watch out for: Christian Träsch, who came from the TSV 1860 last year, is yet another “all-rounder” who can play defensive midfield as well as both wing positions, while Sebastian Rudy, yet another player from the own youth who just signed his first contract as a professional a few weeks ago (until 2010), is an option for the offensive midfield, or, who would’ve guessed, both wing positions (we do appreciate versatility, we really do).

And then there’s Georges Mandjeck, who I know hardly anything about, except that he’s currently playing for Cameroon at the Olympic games. He hasn’t played a single match last season and now returned to Stuttgart from a half-season loan deal at Kaiserslautern. I’m not sure how much of a chance he’s going to get in the first team, to be honest.

And just for fun, two more names one might want to remember: Patrick Funk, who joined the first team in the last training camp, and Clemens Walch, who came from Red Bull Salzburg this summer. Both might eventually get a chance to prove themselves for the first team, and if it’s just in test matches.

Attack: I don’t have to tell you who Mario Gomez is, right? Now that he’s on his way back to good shape, it’s going to be difficult for any other striker to compete with him for a place in the starting line up, which leaves one vacant spot. Cacau, in case he’s not injured, is a forward who catches attention especially when it comes to teamwork. Ciprian Marica seems to have remembered how to score goals, so he’s surely going to get a few chances as well.

Manuel Fischer, who has already been called the next Mario Gomez, is eager to follow the example of previous striker talents of the VfB and has already shown his goalscoring talents in the last match of last season, where he with one goal and one penalty helped saving the chance for an international competition.

Despite his apology and being welcomed back as ‘the lost son’, I doubt Danijel Ljuboja will get much of a chance and probably won’t be more than a substitute player. Matthias Morys is another young striker from Stuttgart’s own youth who sooner or later might get his chance.

So far, every position has at least two players able to play it, with the possible exception of the right back, where one of the fullbacks would have to jump in, and the defensive midfield, where a player to jump in for Pardo wouldn’t just have to replace his skills, but also his leading abilities.
It’s good to know we have a more solid squad than last season, but I hope this doesn’t mean that the young players won’t get a chance. Last season saw Andreas Beck and Christian Gentner leaving because they saw better opportunities in other places, and I hope we’ll be able to keep the other youngsters a little longer (especially Manuel Fischer doesn’t seem like he’ll be happy with spending the season on the bench).

To be more attractive to younger players, the youth department of the VfB has at least loosened the rules: Until last season, in the youth teams tattoos, long hair or jewellery weren’t accepted, but the club direction had to keep up with the times and is going to allow a more fashion-focused outfit in the future. Well, it’s not like the players cared about any of these rules as soon as they had their professional contracts, as one can see on the hair of Gomez or Khedira, or on Fischer and Morys, who have lately found a fancy in Cristiano Ronaldo like earrings. Well, as long as they keep playing football…

And to prove that the VfB Stuttgart isn’t only a club to care about its young players, but also their families, this little story: Rani Khedira, younger brother of Sami, has played for the U14 last season and is now probably going to play for the U15 this year, where his trainer should be the older brother of Christian Gentner, Michael. Football indeed seems to run in the family, in Stuttgart at least.

The idea is to extend training time and spend two, three hours on the place, without the players rushing home for lunch in-between and having to warm up twice a day.

“Effectively, we’ll have more training minutes per day”, is Veh’s reason to change the schedule.

Now, I don’t know if the new plan was used last week already, but either way, the team was, as expected, successful in the DFB Cup against Hansa Lüneburg. The VfB, playing without the injured Bastürk, Boulahrouz and Cacau, and Jan Simak, who had been red-carded in the last cup match with Carl Zeiss Jena and been banned for one match, started into the match eagerly, making it clear that losing was not an option. The quick 1:0 (Lanig, in minute 11) and the 2:0 by Hilbert, scored in the 26th minute, pointed in the right direction. However, in the first half it seemed as if Mario Gomez was in just the same shape as during the Euro: he missed a few ‘100 percent’ chances, one of which was the carbon copy of the missed chance against Austria that started the whole misery.

The second half-time started just like the first had ended, with a missed chance by Gomez (Armin Veh’s comment later: “Well, I have to admit it looked a little funny at some moments”). Every failed move was commented by the audience with cheering and ironic applause, but with two goals (58th and 79th minute) he showed that “nobody needs to worry about me”, as he said after the match. He may not be fully back to the shape of the footballer of the year 2007, but he’s on the way there.

The 5:0 (final result) then came as an own goal by Berger.

Next on the plan is the UEFA Cup qualification match against ETO Györ on Thursday. After the first Bundesliga match on Sunday, the players who have been called up for the national team squad are going to leave for the weekend.

Together with Thomas Hitzlsperger and Mario Gomez, Serdar Tasci is going to travel to Nuremberg. It’s not the first time he’s been called up, but until now he was injured every time he should have put on the DFB jersey. But now, he’s in great shape, even started training a whole week before his colleagues and is looking forward to the experience.

One player who is not going to join the team is Jens Lehmann, who now officially retired from the national team. I’m not going to get too detailed here, since Angela already wrote a piece about his decision at the world cup blog.

On a completely different note, what had been expected for months now finally happened, and Christian Gentner’s loan contract with the VfL Wolfsburg has been dissolved and he’s going to stay with the Wolves until 2010. I’ve never been happy with him leaving in the first place, but even I am forced to admit that for his career, it was the best decision, and that Stuttgart has enough midfielders to get along without him (if we aren’t struck by a flood of injuries, like last season, that is).

This means that three of Stuttgart’s strikers scored, and that with Cacau not playing due to muscular problems and Manuel Fischer missing two good chances. Seems like the striker department should not cause me as much worry as I had expected.

Especially not after I caught a video from the match that featured an interview with Mario Gomez, in which he said the following: “I never negotiated with any other club. The VfB made very clear that they wanted to keep me here and I accept that.”

On the question whether he’s already annoyed by all the fuss around him, he answers “no, that’s over, I’m here with the VfB and I’m looking forward to the new season.”

Now, even though that isn’t exactly new, it still gets more relieving every time I hear it.

The next match for the VfB should not be much of a challenge in theory. But we all know the DFB Cup has its own rules and so I hope the team treats the upcoming match on Sunday against FC Hansa Lüneburg as serious as they should. After all their trainer has been successful in that tournament before: Ralf Sievers played for Eintracht Frankfurt in 1988, when they won the Cup.

The FC plays in the Oberliga, that’s four leagues below Stuttgart. For them, it might well be the match of the year. Nevertheless, I think that it’s quite realistic to assume that the VfB will make it to the next round.

Especially since it’s the first competitive match this season that’s also going to feature Hitzlsperger, Lehmann and Gomez, who came home from their post Euro holidays too late to help out in the UI Cup match.

And with this sort-of match preview, I have to say goodbye for the weekend, since I’ll be on a short, three day holiday trip. I don’t even know if I’ll be back early enough to watch the game on Sunday. Apologies in advance, I hope that there’s going to be one point in this season where I can actually write a match report down that features my opinion based on what I saw, and not just some figures I had to copy from another page. Sorry!

The season opening itself was mostly, well, family entertainment: Some football games for the kids, a football table and a stage on which the audience could see a Puma fashion show, two bands, our annoying mascot letting itself be celebrated, cheerleaders that were borrowed from a local American Football team, and an interview with Horst Heldt, which was about the only interesting thing about the afternoon.

As opposed to the previous years, the team presentation wouldn’t happen until later, in the stadium, and the more or less traditional autograph session had been completely cancelled (this is the point where I have to admit that I really was hoping to get a few signatures on my VfB jersey, right?).

Once we got into the stadium/arena, we saw the signs with the new name, which were supposed to be un-covered during the ceremony, half-visible already. The three men responsible for the re-naming (Stuttgart mayor Dr. W. Schuster, VfB President Erwin Staudt and Dr. Klaus Maier, whose job description I had to copy/paste from a website: Executive Vice President Sales & Marketing Mercedes-Benz Cars) each held a short speech.
Then eight hundred children ran into the stadium with plates in their hand. Apparently the plan was that they first should show the city’s crest, the VfB logo and the Mercedes star and then turn them around to show the new name: Mercedes Benz Arena.
I say “apparently” because somehow, that didn’t work out at all, and we just got to see a white space with nothing written on it. In the newspaper the next day it was blamed on the heat.

After some “entertainment” - a band from a local radio station and those cheerleaders again - the team and coaching staff was presented to the fans.

A special moment was when Danijel Ljuboja wasn’t announced like the other players, but got handed the microphone instead, and apologised for what he had done two years ago. A few boos were heard, but soon became inaudible within the applause. Later, when he played in the second half of the match, some fans even started chanting his name.

Finally, after more than two hours of sitting around in our newly-named arena (I’m not sure how long I’ll be able to hang on with that), the match started.
And it was a quite good match, especially the first half.

The thing I remember mostly is how well the back four worked together. I was expecting things to fall apart more or less after the departure of Meira and as Delpierre and Tasci were once again playing fullbacks, I had already prepared to watch the usual disaster. But, no:
Instead of disappearing, like they so often did when together, they worked out just fine. Delpierre especially seems to grow on the added responsibility instead of being put under pressure.

Next surprise was Boulahrouz as a rightback - I always figured he’d be the man next to Delpierre and only jump in at the right position if necessary, but he played there amazingly well. And even Arthur Boka was having a couple of really bright moments.

So, even though there were quite a few more scenes in Stuttgart’s penalty area than I usually like to see in a match, it was a relieving sight, because they were able to clear almost every dangerous situation. And if Arsenal nevertheless got a chance to shoot at the goal, Lehmann was there.

Yes, our new goalkeeper did some quite nice saves during the first half. It was reassuring to see that he’s still in top shape and if he continues to play the way he did, we might end up conceding a lot less goals than last season.

So, while the defense and the midfield worked out quite nicely during the first half, we didn’t get to finish. There were a handful of well-executed free kicks and even some chances from play, but the final bit seemed to miss. Mario ended up in Arsenal’s offside trap over and over again and came a tad too late on other occasions.

It’s not something I like to see, mostly because of that idea that he might just have scored from that position before the Euro. Or maybe Arsenal were defending rather well, I don’t know; Even though the Arsenal fan next to me said “oh, look, our defense is just as crappy as yours!” (Hi David, if you’re reading this! *waves*)

The major difference between first and second half can be assigned to two changes: Khedira came for Pardo and Simak left the pitch and was replaced by Bastürk. After that, the playing was a lot more forward, more offensive, but also a bit riskier. At first it seemed to pay off, as Bastürk scored a couple of minutes into the second half, but soon they were back at the old habit of losing the ball too quickly.

It’s something that happened before with Bastürk, which is why I prefer seeing Simak on the pitch. Even though one has to admit that Yildiray is always one to surprise both audience and the opponent with a quick trick and has some great ideas in offensive play - there must be a way to benefit from that without the ball ending up with the opponent over and over again.

There were more goal chances, though, and they got the ball to the height of the penalty area quite often, but then it seemed the team lacked the idea of what to do with it then. And even if there had been a possibility to cross to someone near the goal - somehow our strikers failed to show up in the penalty box, especially after Gomez left in minute 63.

The speed of the match had increased; a lot of the players seemed eager to prove themselves, like Hilbert, who was pacing up and down like I seldomly saw it before, but the actions were a little too hectical. I suppose he really wants to succeed in the league and is hoping to get back to the national team, after being left out for the Euro.

Same goes for Ljuboja, who of course had been hoping for that chance quite a long time, or Matthias Morys, a young striker who was hoping to leave a good impression for the first team. All in all it was a combination of a few players trying too hard and a lack of fine-tuning and adjustment along the players, who of course don’t yet know each other well enough.

So, that’s what was responsible for Stuttart then conceding three goals in the second half, along with some problems in the defense - the stable back four from the first half had been completely replaced, except for Boulahrouz, and with one player who is actually a midfielder and one who played his first match with that team ever, one can’t expect too much of a defense.

All in all, it was a good match, though, and Stuttgart played very decently against such a big club. Now if our strikers get their shit together (it’s really amazing how little I’m worried about our defense and how good it feels to have an existing midfield), the next season can come ahead.

To finish the evening, we saw (or rather, didn’t see as we were on the wrong side of the arena) a firework. Despite some lapses in organisation (the opening), planning (the re-naming) and ability to score (the match), it was a good day, and I don’t even want to hear speculations about how much money I might have spent in the fan shop.

Stuttgart will play FC St. Pauli at the Millerntor later today in a match that I, of course, won’t be able to see. It’s almost beginning to turn into a tradition, isn’t it? The team is in good shape, even though I don’t quite know what’s going with Cacau, who seems to have muscular problems and wasn’t even on the bench for the Arsenal match.

Now, would Mario Gomez indeed sign a contract with Bayern Munich? I don’t know. As things stand, I only know what I get from various sources.
There’s Hoeneß’ claim that Bayern had almost signed him, and let’s not forget Rummenigge said something along those lines as well a few days ago.
Then there is what’s written on Gomez’ homepage, which is: “I never said I wanted to leave the club this summer. And I still have a contract with the VfB Stuttgart.”
Gomez’ advisor Uli Ferber says that he doesn’t know of any negotiations, and that all requests were handed to the VfB.
Sporting director Horst Heldt says the same as he said in the past weeks, which is that Stuttgart are not looking to sell Gomez this summer.

So, on the one hand Gomez and Stuttgart claim that there are no plans, but on the other Bayern seem to be surprisingly sure they can have him any time they want to, even though it didn’t work out this summer. Though one has to add that Hoeneß’ statement was printed in the same newspaper that also “knew” that Aleks Hleb was going to join Bayern (what is he doing in Barcelona, then, I wonder?) and which came to a certain negative fame when they tried to involve Bastian Schweinsteiger in some betting scandal that apparently never happened.

And, to be honest, it would be stupid from Stuttgart’s side to sell Gomez to Bayern at any point in his carreer. And I can’t see the major advance Gomez would get from a transfer there as opposed to some Spanish or English top club. I don’t think he’d do it, either, but then I don’t know him as a person. But it does give me quite a headache to think about the whole issue repeatedly.

ETO Györ finished third in the Hungarian League last season and took on Georgian club FC Zestafoni in the first qualification round.

That’s about all I know about this club, and Stuttgart’s officials don’t know much more than that, either:
“Personally, I don’t know the team at all. But we’ll watch the club and get ourselves some video material”, said coach Armin Veh, Horst Heldt added, “the club is an unknown name for me.”

Both emphasize that they want to reach the next round, though. Let’s hope we’ll know more in two weeks. The first leg match will be at 14. August in Stuttgart, the second leg is going to be played at 28. August (in, I suppose, Györ, if that’s the name of the city).

One sentence that he said in the post match interview seems to nail it: “It takes two teams to play a match, and they definitely weren’t playing football.”

He adds, “They were only defending, and while we had more ball posession and one, two chances, we didn’t use them. That kind of match is always hard to play.”

Nevertheless, after 120 minutes which probably made Mario Gomez, who was watching on the tribunes, stifle more than the one yawn that was caught on camera, a beautiful free kick goal by Jan Simak and two goals from Ciprian Marica, who might show this season that he hasn’t forgotten how to score goals, Stuttgart is through to the second qualification round for the UEFA-Cup. Magnin, by the way, also knows that Cipri only scored twice because “we’ve been training together for the last two weeks. He learned everything from me.”

The opponent for the next round will drawn on Friday.

While the fans should have been if not by the match itself, at least be pleased by the result, one event caused protest among the audience: When the players went to the curve to celebrate with their fans, they didn’t get the expected cheering, but were booed out and partly even insulted. The reason? Danijel Ljuboja, who hadn’t even played, had come with the team.

The fans still haven’t forgiven him the contract stunt from two years ago. The by now inevitable comment of Horst Heldt: “It’s an impertinence what a few fans dared to do there. The team wanted to say thank you and was booed. Ljuboja is a part of the team, and the players’ reaction [leaving the pitch without any more celebration] was absolutely correct.”

Now, I do agree with him to a certain degree, and I think even Ljubo deserves at least a new chance to prove that he changed. But still I can’t help but shake my head at Heldt’s comment since the situation reminds so much of the goalkeeper problem of last season, when somehow neither coach nor management said anything supportive about Schäfer until it was too late.

There’s something about the VfB Stuttgart’s transfers this season that reminds of this, except that we are buying players which are rumoured to be, well, difficult, and not selling them. It’s been often connected to the financial state of the VfB. Fact is, the club can’t afford spending as much money on transfers as, say, Bayern Munich, or even Werder Bremen, and so they end up with transfers that cause a certain degree of scepticism.

Like Jan Simak, who is a great player (and someone for standards. I don’t think we hand someone for goals after free kicks since the days of Krassimir Balakov), but didn’t leave the right impression the first time he played in the Bundesliga for Hannover and Leverkusen and developed problems with alcohol and a depression.

Or Jens Lehmann, who might still be one of the best goalkeepers around, but, well, hasn’t been nicknamed “Mad Jens” for nothing, and it’s disputable if the time he spent on Arsenal’s bench has actually been doing him any good. Rumour has it that the management is a little scared of him and decided to have him on a leash for the main part of the season (see picture).

Or new fullback Khalid Boulahrouz, who was more or less greeted with being called problem-case by one German tabloid, even though I still haven’t been able to figure out why exactly, except for that old story of his sudden injury shortly before he went to Chelsea.

Or Ljuboja, who was more or less kicked out of the Stuttgart squad and who the club tried to get rid of for two years with loan deals at Hamburg and Wolfsburg, and who is now returning and claims to regret what he did (though he had just signed until 2009, he suddenly demanded a doubling of his earnings).

I’m almost tempted to say that it’s a shame that Meira left, he’d have perfectly fit in with all the other problem cases. But even without our ex-captain and without Boateng, who I suppose won’t come after all, one might think there’s a lot of danger potential in this new team.

Of course a certain part of that is the usual tabloid talk, and I’d like to remind that all of these are, beyond everything else, very good football players. Still, I have to admit a certain concern about how much this is going to influence the team character, especially with all the young players from the own youth, who so often are described as “very decent boys”.

Most of the time I’m strangely optimistic about next season, though. Well, we’ll see how it’s going after the first matches.

Oh, right, and talking about matches, Stuttgart is up against Saturn Ramenskoje on Sunday. It’s only the second time the clubs meet, after the first-leg UI cup match of last weekend, which the Russians won 1:0. Trying my new optimism, here’s what speaks for Stuttgart:

- It’s a home match and there’ll be a lot more support than the thirty-something fans who travelled along with the team to the outskirts of Moscow,

- There has been one more week of training (one of the main reasons for the loss was the lack of fitness, while Ramenskoje are already playing league matches)

- while Stuttgart used the week for a training camp, Ramenskoje had a match on Wednesday.

The players who returned from the Euro in the last week, namely Hitzlsperger, Gomez, Lehmann and Bouahrouz are not going to play, but apart from that, all players are fit and available for the last chance to get something good out of last season.