A must read interview with Hoffenheim's sugar daddy Dietmar Hopp. (Spiegel Online) The swimsuit edition of the Hoffenheim story. And a small correction: the article quotes Ralf Rangnick as saying Hoffenheim has the same budget as Energie Cottbus. He was comparing Hoffenheim's wage budget (€23m) with Cottbus' overall budget (€23m). Click to continue reading...

1. FC Koln
In: Pierre Wome (undisclosed, Werder Bremen), Miso Brecko (free, Hamburg SV), Ishiaku Manasseh (undisclosed, Duisburg)
Out: Alpay Ozalan (released), Salvatore Gambino (released), Patrick Helmes (undisclosed, Bayer Leverkusen)

1899 Hoffenheim
In: Wellington (undisclosed, Internacional)
Out:

Arminia Bielefeld
In: Nico Herzog (undisclosed, Alemannia Aachen)
Out:

Bayer Leverkusen
In: Patrick Helmes (undisclosed, 1. Click to continue reading...

The unexpected bookend to yesterday's surprising transfer of Marcell Jansen to Hamburg is Bayern's acquisition of right back Massimo Oddo on a season-long loan from AC Milan. The 32-year old brings both international class and a warm body to shore up the team's dangerously thin defense. According to Bayern's [. Click to continue reading...

Wow, während Schalke gerade die Hucke voll kriegt ( sacht man hier so bei uns im Pott ), lese ich bei Nicole, dass der Marcell Jansen zum HSV wechselt. Etwas ausführlicher dann doch beim HSV. Geld genug sollte ja vorhanden gewesen sein, nachdem man ja den ein oder anderen teuren Spieler abgegeben hat. Click to continue reading...

Who says that Spain can't win a title?

Watching Spain throughout this competition, one couldn't sit back and not be amazed at how well they played. Even when challenged by Sweden (which in all honesty could have been a draw) and Italy (they tried to attack but when your opponent plays everyone behind the ball, breaking them down is next to impossible), they still found a way to win.

Click to continue reading...

Germany 1-0 Austria
It wasn't exactly an inspiring victory, but Germany have booked their place in the quarter-finals with this win. They've made hard work of what should have been an easy group, but now it's time for them to really get their act together for the knock-out stages. They did at least look much more solid defensively here, although that's kind of hard to judge against a team as goal-shy as Austria. Click to continue reading...

Croatia 2-1 Germany
So much for Germany's status as tournament favourites. I don't know if they just collapsed under the weight of expectations after their first game or what, but if so, Dear boys: You are not Spain. Stop being all neurotic. Love, me.

The first sign that maybe it wasn't going to be Germany's day came about 20 minutes in, after a relatively quiet start by both teams, as Mario Gomez put the ball into the net only for it to be (correctly) ruled out for offside. Click to continue reading...

Well, that didn't help clear things up.

In a tournament where there was no clear front-runner, Germany was considered to be the best bet to make a deep run. Before today's games, there was no clear favorite, but there looked to be a four team group that the champion would probably come from. Click to continue reading...

I'm sorry about the complete lack of updates here, except for the odd Weekly Dose edition. I'm currently spending most of my time over at the Germany World Cup Blog. But I hope to have the odd Bundesliga related post ready to help those who don't care about the Euros through the next month. The Bundesliga [. Click to continue reading...