This weekend the Bundesliga 2025-26 season will finally be upon us. The German Cup has already given us a taste of shocks and giant-killings, but the real drama still awaits. A heavyweight clash between Bayern Munich and RB Leipzig on Friday is the first fixture to kick the season off with a bang.
With the beginning of the season at our fingertips, it’s time to delve into the details of the next season and see how things are stacked up. Will Leverkusen face disappointment under ten Hag? Will Dortmund find their feet again after a rocky 24/25 season? Will Bayern steam ahead to dominate the league once again?
Will Bayern win the Bundesliga again?
Bayern has been the goliath of the Bundesliga for over a decade. Excluding Bayer Leverkusen’s invincible Bundesliga run in the 2023/24 season, Bayern had won eleven titles in a row previous and won the season following.
Muller has now moved to the Vancouver Whitecaps for his seemingly penultimate season as a professional footballer. Jamal Musiala, Bayern’s starboy, will be absent for the first half of the season as a result of the horror injury he suffered during the Club World Cup, leaving him with a fractured fibula and ankle. The arrival of Luis Diaz is already beginning to look promising, with the Colombian scoring in their 2-1 Supercup win over Stuttgart.
Leverkusen underwent major changes this summer. Xabi Alonso departed to join Real Madrid as head coach, replaced by ex-Manchester United coach Erik ten Hag. Florian Wirtz and Jeremie Frimpong joined Liverpool, and their captain Granit Xhaka joined newly-promoted Premier League side Sunderland. The most high profile arrivals at Leverkusen so far have included Jarell Quansah from Liverpool and Malik Tillman from PSV Eindhoven. It’s safe to say that Leverkusen’s time as a title challenger is over for the time being.
Borussia Dortmund are always a strange one. Coming so close to the title so many times but never able to get over the line. Their recent stint under Nuri Sahin was an entirely failed experiment, but Niko Kovac steadied the ship upon his arrival, guiding them to a fourth place finish on the final day of last season. Despite this, they have done very little in the transfer market this summer and have a clear lack of depth, especially with many of their starting players this season still out injured. Dortmund could crumble under their lack of depth, or they could finally surge ahead with a great run. Dortmund seem the likeliest to mount a title challenge against Bayern in the closing stages of the season.
Who will qualify for Europe?
Last season, Leverkusen, Eintracht Frankfurt, and Borussia Dortmund qualified for the Champions League through a top four finish. Freiburg and Mainz gained qualification to the Europa and Conference leagues respectively.
Leverkusen’s previously mentioned change in manager and loss of key players will certainly become a major roadblock in their quest for a top four finish this season. While still predicted to finish in second place, it’s difficult to see that happening. Frankfurt have lost their main firepower through the departures of both Omar Marmoush to Manchester City in January and Hugo Ekitike this summer. These two players accounted for 44% of the team’s Bundesliga goals and they were the only players to score more than 5 goals for Frankfurt. Without a solid goalscoring replacement this season, Frankfurt may flounder.
RB Leipzig, with the arrival of Johan Bakayoko, look likely to find themselves in a European spot this season after a 3-2 loss to Stuttgart on the final day left them in seventh place. Leipzig and Stuttgart may find themselves in a battle for top four this season, with Stuttgart retaining 23-year-old Nick Woltemade, who provided 12 goals and 2 assists for his team last season.
Freiburg and Mainz could find themselves in similar positions to last year, though it seemed lucky if anything that some bigger teams underperformed with both Leipzig and Stuttgart both finishing agonisingly close to a spot in European competition. Mainz might find themselves out of Europe already, having lost their away leg of the Conference League play-off 2-1 to Norwegian side Rosenborg.
There’s always the chance that Werder Bremen take a spot but given their 1-0 loss to Arminia Bielefeld to exit the DFB Pokal last week, there are teams you might fancy have a better chance.
Who will be relegated from the Bundesliga?
The relegation battle this season might just be interesting.
Koln are the favourites to return to the 2. Bundesliga, and it’s likely that the season will play out this way. Heidenheim were very lucky to survive their relegation play-off against Elversberg which saw a 95th minute goal keep them in the top flight.
Focus should lie on the 2 clubs from Hamburg, St. Pauli and Hamburger SV. St. Pauli were quite lucky to finish in 14th place last season, despite only taking 3 points from a possible 15 in the last five games of the season, they knew they were safe on the final day.
HSV are returning to the top flight after 7 years of exile in the second division. They will want to remain at all costs this season, and if they can survive, while knocking St Pauli down to the 2. Bundesliga, it would surely be even sweeter.
While Koln will probably bounce back down to the 2. Bundesliga. It seems that Heidenheim’s luck might run out this time, too, and they will be relegated. It’s between HSV and Pauli to fight to send their Hamburger rival to the relegation play-off to keep themselves safe. I would lean towards St. Pauli remaining in the Bundesliga as they have more experience now in the top flight and they have seasoned captain Jackson Irvine to lead them. We won’t have to wait long to see the rivals go head-to-head as they face each other on Matchday 2, Friday 29th August, in HSV’s Volksparkstadion.
From Bayern’s hunt to retain the title and the battle for Europe amongst the German giants, to the return of the Hamburg Derby, this year’s Bundesliga will have one thing guaranteed: drama.
