After winning the championship title and the departure of Xabi Alonso, Bayer Leverkusen have been unable to find their best form. Over the following two seasons, the “Pharmacists” languished in domestic competitions and could not find worthy replacements for the departed coach and top players. This summer, Bayer were taken over by Carles Martínez. The relatively young Spanish coach managed to improve the team’s play fairly quickly, which is now reflected in Bayer’s fourth place in the Bundesliga and their winning streak in the Europa League. The only unquestionably disastrous match of the current season was played by the “Pharmacists” last Sunday. It seemed that the team never even came out onto the pitch in Hoffenheim, allowing their opponents to create a multitude of scoring chances, three of which were converted into goals — 0:3. The last time Bayer won the national cup was in 2024, when they managed to complete a domestic double. The “Pharmacists” began this season’s tournament with a crushing 4:0 victory over Wehen. It took place in their first official match of the season. Since then, in only one of Bayer’s matches across the three competitions in which they are involved have Martínez’s players failed to score at least two goals. The Leverkusen club’s high scoring rate is particularly notable given the large number of injured players. They include Gela Doué, Loïc Badé, Eliesse Ben Seghir, Kenneth Eichhorn and others, whose combined transfer value amounts to almost half of the total value of the entire squad. Last season, Nürnberg extended their contract with Miroslav Klose, entrusting the legendary Germany striker with leading the team as its coach. The players and coaching staff repaid the club’s trust with confident performances and a current second place in the 2. Bundesliga. Nürnberg suffered their first defeat of the season last Saturday, also failing to score for the first time this season against an opponent, Kaiserslautern. Overall, if we set aside the difference in divisions, two teams that score plenty of goals and are in excellent form will meet in Leverkusen. Most likely, there will be plenty of goals in this match.