Borussia Mönchengladbach vs Bayern Munich

The 2021/22 Bundesliga season gets underway this weekend as Borussia Mönchengladbach play host to defending champions Bayern Munich at Borussia Park.

A tight 1-0 DFB-Pokal win over lower-league side Kaiserslautern fired Gladbach off to a flying start to the new competitive season as they hope to improve on a dismal eighth-place finish last term. Tasked with bringing European football back to Borussia Park, new manager Adi Hütter can rely on Gladbach’s traditionally strong home league starts. Indeed, ‘Die Fohlen‘ have racked up three clean sheets in the last four opening league games in a Bundesliga season on home turf (W2, D1). Worryingly, though, Borussia accrued just 28 out of the possible 51 home league points last season. Interestingly, none of Gladbach’s ten home Bundesliga fixtures this calendar year have ended as a draw (W6, L4), with 70% of those results (win/loss) seeing the victor benefit from scoring first.

After claiming a record-extending 31st Bundesliga title and the ninth in succession back in 2020/21, Bayern Munich went through an uneventful summer. Indeed, Julian Nagelsmann still awaits his first win as a Bayern coach, having lost three of his inaugural four matches in charge (D1), all of which saw the ‘Bavarians’ concede 2+ goals. Following a lackluster off-season campaign, Nagelsmann will be under severe pressure to start the competitive season well. Bayern will be hoping to end a two-match losing Bundesliga streak at Borussia Park, which could be easier said than done considering they’ve conceded over 1.5 goals in three of their last four top-flight trips to this venue. On a more positive note, the perennial German champions haven’t lost any of their last nine Bundesliga openers (W8, D1).