Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 17 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
0‑3 to Bayern Munich, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
6 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Borussia Mönchengladbach has to find a result from somewhere.
Moritz Nicolas and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Borussia Mönchengladbach can tell you which week it ends in.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Dominik Krämer after 0‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
0‑3 to Mainz 05, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Borussia Mönchengladbach this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 22 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Borussia Mönchengladbach heard it as anything else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Borussia Mönchengladbach this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 20. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Conceding is one thing; the response is what tells you about a dressing room. Shuto Machino had Borussia Mönchengladbach level again within 4 minutes, and Werder Bremen never got to play with a lead at all.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Kevin Stöger was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Something was said to Moritz Nicolas and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Nicolas Kühn's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
Marked 4.85. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Borussia Mönchengladbach have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Ko Itakura wants continental football; whether Borussia Mönchengladbach can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
Noahkai Banks is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Union Berlin in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Borussia Mönchengladbach will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
The hardest thing about being 18 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Lennart Karl did not need any: 8.22, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.07 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Kevin Stöger and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
He is 18 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Borussia Mönchengladbach know it.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 8 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Borussia Mönchengladbach hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
6 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Borussia Dortmund were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
A 2‑1 win over Borussia Dortmund, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Marked 8.02 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Borussia Mönchengladbach told Franck Honorat something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Borussia Mönchengladbach has to find a result from somewhere.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Lukas Ullrich is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Fabian Schleusener was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Dominik Krämer after 1‑4, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
Kevin Stöger and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
At 18 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
The fixture the calendar is arranged around. Form goes out of the window, the table is not consulted, and for ninety minutes Borussia Mönchengladbach will be judged on one thing only.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Franck Honorat signs something — a contract at Borussia Mönchengladbach or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Köln in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with Hamburger SV the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that Borussia Mönchengladbach will enjoy reviewing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Borussia Mönchengladbach this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 18 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Marked 8.36 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 2‑3 defeat, delivered by Dominik Krämer to a room that had heard them before.
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Borussia Mönchengladbach will try again when the window opens; VfL Bochum may not be selling by then.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Alvyn Sanches, and the manager let it.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Dominik Krämer to a room that had heard them before.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
Borussia Mönchengladbach ran out of time with Dynamo Dresden. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Tino Kusanović is 18, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Borussia Mönchengladbach this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
A brace, and Kevin Stöger takes the afternoon — 8.13
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Kevin Stöger provided it, and the 8.13 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Borussia Mönchengladbach have done the hard part with Dynamo Dresden, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Hannover 96 have kept their man, and Borussia Mönchengladbach go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Borussia Mönchengladbach can pretend not to have heard.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $3.7M — a club that wants Dominik Kother enough to be asked twice.
Marked 8.38 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.