Sports Blog 30/07/2015: German Super Cup Preview – Wolfsburg vs Bayern Munich, Saturday 1st August 2015

The Bundesliga may still be 2 weeks away, but German football fans get their first taste of the new season on Saturday as Wolfsburg take on Bayern Munich in the German Super Cup, at 7.30pm on BT Sport Europe.

Like England’s Community Shield (on this Sunday), the Super Cup sees the previous season’s champions take on the cup winner. Wolfsburg take that latter spot in the Super Cup, following a very impressive 2014/15 that saw them finished 2nd in the Bundesliga (granted, 10 points behind Bayern), reach the quarter-finals of the Europa League and, as mentioned, win the DFL-Pokal. That cup victory luckily saw them avoid Bayern or Borussia Dortmund in the semis, instead drawing the then 3. Liga (and now 2. Bundesliga after winning Germany’s 3rd league) Arminia Bielefeld. They did then meet Dortmund in the final, beating the much-beleaguered former champions 3-1 with goals from Luis Gustavo, Bas Dost and Kevin de Bruyne.



Wolfsburg haven’t been too busy over summer, with their main signing being Max Kruse, one of Bundesliga bronze medallists Borussia Monchengladbach’s top scorers last season, for £8.4 million. They could come to regret this, however, if former Chelsea man, and last season’s Bundesliga Player of the Year, de Bruyne makes his long-rumoured move to Manchester City. Even if the Belgian did leave, however, Wolfsburg still have a squad full of quality, including last January’s signing Andre Schurrle, former Bayern man Gustavo and last season’s top scorer Bas Dost, who got 20 goals in all competitions. The Bundesliga runners-up have had a mixed pre-season so far, losing both games at the Emirates Cup last weekend, but still go into the new footballing year at 18/1 to win the league, the joint second best odds alongside Dortmund.

Understandably Wolfsburg and Dortmund sit behind Bayern Munich, who are 1/12 odds on favourites to capture their 4th Bundesliga title in a row, after winning it in such emphatic fashion last season. Bayern have been far busier in the transfer market than their Super Cup opponents; the champions lost perennial Munich midfielder Bastian Schweinsteiger to Manchester United, but seem to have moved quickly to replace him by signing Copa American 2015 winner Arturo Vidal for £28 million from Juventus.



Vidal joins Brazilian attacking midfielder Douglas Costa from Shaktar Donetsk as Bayern’s two headline signings; however, they could be about to lose another one of their star players to England, with the looming threat of Thomas Muller leaving for United or Liverpool. Whilst this may not be too much of an issue given the fantastic form of last year’s star (free) signing Robert Lewandowski, the fact that Franck Ribery won’t be fit at the start of the season means a Muller departure would be a bigger blow than normal.

Despite their memorable 4-1 victory over Bayern in January, complete with braces for Dost and de Bruyne, our Spreadex traders till fancy the German champions to (narrowly) win the Super Cup, with a Bayern Munich/Wolfsburg Goal Supremacy sports spread betting quote of 0.45-0.65 alongside a Total Goals spread of 2.9-3.1.