2026/2027 season

Bundesliga

Team page
Bundesliga · Team page
Borussia Mönchengladbach
Head coach: Eugen Polanski · 4-2-3-1
Rank
18th
Pts
0
P
5
Form
🔴 Very poor

The essentials at a glance

The summary of this page: estimated level of play, form trend and qualitative verdict. For the details, head to the other tabs.

Editors' ratings
4/10
Attack
1/10
Defence
1/10
Form
3/10
Confidence / mood
Current risk:Low

18th with 0 pts from 5 matches: 0 wins, 0 draws, 5 defeats.

7 goals scored, 18 conceded.

TSG Hoffenheim plays in Mönchengladbach.

Sportschau · 18 Oct 2026 · machine-translated

It is an absolute cellar duel: The table last Borussia Mönchengladbach receives the likewise crisis-ridden Hoffenheimer.

Sportschau · 18 Oct 2026 · machine-translated

Borussia Mönchengladbach is sporty on the ground. President Rainer Bonhof left after the lost Derby in Cologne but above all the behavior of some Borussia supporters stunned.

kicker · 13 Oct 2026 · machine-translated

Saïd El Mala’s winner illustrated the task faced by new Die Fohlen manager in reviving an injury-hit team A three-week break was exactly what Borussia Mönchengladbach needed after a chastening start to the Bundesliga campaign and perhaps what their new coach, Alexander Blessin, would have ordered. His first match, a derby against arch-rivals Köln, to train focus? Even better.

The Guardian — Football · 12 Oct 2026

How the team has played recently

Match-by-match results, record and rhythm of the current season.

Latest matches
Lvs 1. FC Köln (A) · 1-2
Lvs 1. FSV Mainz 05 (H) · 3-4
Lvs SC Freiburg (A) · 0-5
Lvs SV 07 Elversberg (H) · 3-4
Lvs RB Leipzig (A) · 0-3
LLLLL
7 scored / 18 conceded over 5 matches played
Rest: 7 days since the last match · 1 match played in the last 15 days
Home form
0W - 0D - 2L
Away form
0W - 0D - 3L
Statistics

Computed from this season's scores, every time the page is shown.

Goals scored per match
1.4
Goals conceded per match
3.6
At home
6 scored · 8 conceded in 2 matches
Away
1 scored · 10 conceded in 3 matches
Over 2.5 goals
5 of 5
Both teams score
3 of 5
Clean sheets
0 of 5
Failed to score
2 of 5
Cumulative points vs league average

Not enough matchdays recorded yet for this curve — history builds up with every standings refresh.

How Borussia Mönchengladbach play

System, playing identity, and what sets the team apart at both ends of the pitch.

Playing identity
Preferred system
4-2-3-1
Philosophy
Polanski wants to break with last season's defensive back-five approach and establish a more attacking and courageous possession game, with four attacking players and quick combinations (statements reported by 90min at the resumption of the season).
Attacking strengths
Structural weak point: 42 goals scored in 2025-26, the club's lowest total since its return to the Bundesliga in 2008-09; pre-season was prolific but the first competitive Bundesliga match ended with 0 goals and an xG of 1.02 at Leipzig.
Defensive solidity
53 goals conceded in 2025-26 (goal difference -11); at Leipzig on 29/08, the team conceded 3 goals against 3.96 xG for the opposition, with Moritz Nicolas long limiting the damage before the second-half collapse.
Pressing
Not verified: no source consulted provides figures (PPDA, height of ball recoveries) on Gladbach's pressing in 2026-27. Polanski announces more attacking aggression, but after Leipzig he himself admitted that “the energy was gone, the distances too big” in the second half (WZ, 30/08).
Transitions
Not precisely verified. The bundesliga.com report on Leipzig - Gladbach notes unconverted Gladbach chances early in the match, then a loss of control after the break; no transition data could be cross-checked.
StrengthA very convincing summer pre-season (unbeaten, including a 2-1 win over Aston Villa according to bundesliga.com) extended by a 5-0 in the 1st round of the Cup at Schott Mainz; recruitment targeted at young players with resale potential (Itakura, Lidberg, Bolin, Mohya); return of Tim Kleindienst after his serious knee injury.
WeaknessA chronic finishing deficit and little depth behind Kleindienst; the departure of Rocco Reitz (RB Leipzig), who wore the armband in his absence last season, and of Nico Elvedi after 318 Bundesliga matches; inability to convert pre-season form from matchday 1.

The mood around the club, and who is missing

Internal climate, relationship with the supporters, and known absences before the next match.

Mood
Squad confidence
Fragile. The 0-3 conceded at Leipzig cooled the optimism born of pre-season and the 5-0 in the first round of the cup, and the week brought a further very bad piece of news with Enzo Leopold's cruciate ligament rupture, a summer signing injured in training before even making his debut. Two grounds for satisfaction remain: Tim Kleindienst completed his first ninety minutes in more than fifteen months at Leipzig, and young Mathieu Nguefack made a successful entrance on his Bundesliga debut. Hosting Elversberg is presented internally as the match to react in.
Coach / players / board relationship
Rouven Schröder announced Enzo Leopold's injury himself, focusing first on the player: “Above all it is a very heavy blow for Enzo.” The sporting directors also continue to adjust the squad after the deadline, with a loan for Tomáš Čvančara in the Czech Republic under consideration, while Joe Scally, at one point reported to be leaving, has ultimately stayed at least until the winter window. No tension between Eugen Polanski and his executives is reported by any major source.
Mood with the supporters
A highly mobilised and critical fanbase, particularly since Rocco Reitz's move to Leipzig, whose goal against the club that developed him on matchday 1 reopened the wound. The public expects an immediate reaction at the Borussia-Park against a promoted side, in a context where the club has not reached the top half since 2020-21. The appearance of an academy graduate such as Mathieu Nguefack is exactly the kind of signal that fanbase demands.
Pressure on the head coach
Real. The press has credited Eugen Polanski with a deadline running to the autumn to erase last season's timid style, and a defeat to a promoted side at the Borussia-Park would immediately reopen the debate. For now he relies on choices he defends publicly, backing both a possible start for Joe Scally and Mathieu Nguefack's promotion, and managing Tim Kleindienst's workload cautiously.
Club objectives
Reaching the top half of the table for the first time since 2020-21, an objective relayed by bundesliga.com. The club are in no European competition in 2026-27 and are therefore concentrating their season on the league and the DFB-Pokal, in which they qualified by thrashing TSV Schott Mainz 5-0 in the first round. No European ambition is stated by the board.
Recent internal tensions
Rocco Reitz's transfer to Leipzig remains the main point of friction between the board and part of the support, all the more so as he scored against his former club on the opening matchday. To that is added an injury list growing heavier at the worst moment, with five players unavailable before hosting Elversberg and a signing lost for six months.
Absences
InjuredEnzo Leopold — Rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament in the right knee sustained in training on 2 September, officially confirmed on the 3rd: surgery scheduled and around six months out.
InjuredJens Castrop — Operated on his shoulder; out for around a month according to LigaInsider, with no return date given.
InjuredYukhym Konoplya — Muscle injury; in fitness rehabilitation for more than a month, with progress reported in early September but not yet a return to competition.
InjuredTomáš Čvančara — Adductor muscle injury for around three months; reported to be close to a loan in the Czech Republic.
DoubtfulDaiki Hashioka — Head and cervical spine injury at the end of August; his absence opens the way for Joe Scally at right-back against Elversberg.

Before kick-off

What to know before the next match: statistical form, qualitative analysis, and a computed estimate of the 1/X/2 probabilities.

Next match

Borussia Mönchengladbach — TSG Hoffenheim

At homeSunday 18 October at 17:30Matchday 6
It's today. Kick-off time confirmed by the league. Paris time · football-data.org fixtures.

Prediction, odds and form of both teams →

What the press says
Prediction
EstimateBorussia Mönchengladbach — TSG Hoffenheim
41 %
1 · Borussia Mönchengladbach
19 %
X · draw
40 %
2 · TSG Hoffenheim
In-house calculation, from this page's standings data alone: 5 matches played by Borussia Mönchengladbach, 5 matches by TSG Hoffenheim. Confidence: medium
The formula, in plain words — with this match's figures
  1. League average. 193 goals scored over 104 team-matches played (18 teams taken into account), i.e. μ = 1.86 goal scored per team per match. This is the reference point: everything that follows is expressed relative to it.
  2. Attacking and defensive strengths. Goals scored (or conceded) per match, divided by μ. 1.00 = exactly average; in defence, above 1.00 means “concedes more than average”.
    TeamGoalsRawKept
    Borussia Mönchengladbach — attack7 in 5 matches0.750.89
    Borussia Mönchengladbach — defence18 in 5 matches1.941.43
    TSG Hoffenheim — attack9 in 5 matches0.970.99
    TSG Hoffenheim — defence13 in 5 matches1.401.18
    The “Kept” column is the result of shrinkage towards the mean: weight = P / (P + 6), i.e. 0.45 for Borussia Mönchengladbach and 0.45 for TSG Hoffenheim. The rest of the weight goes to the league average. This is what stops a lone 5-0 from producing an attack at 3.3 times the average — and hence a 95% probability.
  3. Home advantage (γ). Measured on the league itself: 2.23 goal scored on average by the host against 1.48 by the visitor, over the 44 fixtures present in each team's last 5 matches. Raw ratio 1.51; shrunk towards 1 (weight 0.42, on the log of the ratio) then capped at 1.25 → γ = 1.19. Shrinkage goes towards 1, i.e. no advantage at all: while the sample is small, the model does not assert a home advantage it cannot measure.
  4. Venue correction, specific to each team. Drawn from the home/away split: points per match at the venue concerned are compared to points per match over all fixtures, with stronger shrinkage (weight = P / (P + 8)) and a bound of ±12%.
    Borussia Mönchengladbach at home: 0.00 pts/match versus 0.00 overall over 2 matches → ×1.000
    TSG Hoffenheim away: 0.00 pts/match versus 0.60 overall over 2 matches → ×0.880
  5. Expected goals. One side's attack is set against the other's defence. γ applies to the host only: applying it the other way round too would count the home advantage twice.
    λBorussia Mönchengladbach = 1.86 × 0.89 × 1.18 × 1.19 × 1.000 = 2.32
    λTSG Hoffenheim = 1.86 × 0.99 × 1.43 × 0.880 = 2.30
  6. Poisson grid. Probability of every exact score from 0-0 to 8-8, assuming the two goal totals are independent, then adding up the cells: home win 40.8%, draw 19.2%, away win 40.1% — displayed rounded to whole numbers so that they add up to exactly 100. Most likely exact score in the grid: 2-2 (only 7.0%, which says enough about how unpredictable an exact score is).
Limits of this model — they are not anecdotal.
  • It only knows goals and a venue. Neither absences, suspensions, line-ups, fatigue, stakes, weather nor club context enter the calculation — while the other tabs of this page show that they matter.
  • The assumption that the two goal totals are independent is false in reality: it slightly underestimates tight scores, hence the draw.
  • γ is measured over a rolling window (each team's last 5 matches), not over the whole season.
  • The shrinkage constants (6, 60, 8) and the bounds are choices, not measurements. They were tuned to be cautious early in the season; they were not calibrated on a results history, as none is available here.
  • No after-the-fact evaluation has been made: at this stage, nobody knows whether this model is better or worse calibrated than another.
What other sources say
No external source has been collected for this match. That is the normal state: readings are taken by hand, and an empty box is better than an unverified figure.
This block shows probability estimates, not predictions, and carries no advisory value. The in-house estimate is the result of a formula applied to a small sample; the figures from external sources are reproduced as they were collected, without their method having been verified.

The full squad

The professional squad by position, captain marked with an armband.

Goalkeepers
  • Moritz Nicolas
  • Jan Olschowsky
  • Tobias Sippel
  • Daniel Batz
Defenders
  • Kevin Diks
  • Kō Itakura
  • Joe Scally
  • Lukas Ullrich
  • Daiki Hashioka
  • Fabio Chiarodia
  • David Herold
  • Yukhym Konoplya
  • Jan Leszczyński
Midfielders
  • Kevin Stöger
  • Philipp Sander
  • Florian Neuhaus
  • Jens Castrop
  • Hugo Bolin
  • Wael Mohya
  • Enzo Leopold
  • Mathieu Nguefack
  • Fritz Fleck
  • Zento Uno
Forwards
  • Tim KleindienstC
  • Isac Lidberg
  • Franck Honorat
  • Robin Hack
  • Tomáš Čvančara
  • Shūto Machino
  • Iaia Danfa
Squad last verified on 31 Aug 2026 — source: sport.de (Kader 2026/2027) for the list; captaincy confirmed by fussballdaten.de (08/08/2026, citing kicker) and by gladbachlive.de (24/08/2026).

What has been said recently

Chronological feed of verified information about the club.

rss18 Oct 2026
Listen Live: Borussia Mönchengladbach against TSG Hoffenheim - Bundesliga
Source: Sportschau
rss18 Oct 2026
From 5.30 pm live - Gladbach welcomes Hoffenheim
Source: Sportschau
rss15 Oct 2026
Frankfurt's "key season": threatens to become the SGE Gladbach 2.0?
Source: kicker
rss12 Oct 2026
Blessin in disguise? Gladbach must scale mountain after derby defeat by Köln
Source: The Guardian — Football
rss12 Oct 2026
"Will take a development": Sanders' faith in the turn in Gladbach
Source: kicker
rss12 Oct 2026
Eberl feels with Gladbach: "I was not a lucky charm"
Source: kicker
Injury3 Sep 2026
The club has officially confirmed the diagnosis: Enzo Leopold has ruptured the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee, sustained in training on Wednesday. The 26-year-old midfielder is to undergo surgery and will be out for around six months, possibly longer. Sporting director Rouven Schröder reacted: “It is bitter for us in sporting terms. But above all it is a very heavy blow for Enzo.” The club has undertaken to support him throughout his rehabilitation.
Source: LigaInsider
Club3 Sep 2026
Mathieu Nguefack, 18, made his Bundesliga debut by coming on in the 64th minute for Kevin Stöger in the defeat at Leipzig, and he convinced his head coach. Eugen Polanski stressed that bringing him on was not a development decision but a performance one: “He earned his minutes with his performance. We were looking for more stability, and he provided it.” With Enzo Leopold and Jens Castrop absent, the young midfielder is a candidate for the middle against Elversberg, alongside Philipp Sander.
Source: LigaInsider
Club3 Sep 2026
Having stayed at the club after the window closed, Joe Scally is heading for a start at right-back against Elversberg: Daiki Hashioka has a head injury and Yukhym Konoplya is still in fitness rehabilitation. Eugen Polanski praised his last performance — “he had a very good influence on the match” — and commended the way the 23-year-old American handled a complicated situation. The alternative would be to shift Kevin Diks out wide, which would unbalance the centre of defence.
Source: LigaInsider
Injury3 Sep 2026
Very bad news for the signing Enzo Leopold, who arrived from Hannover 96: he has suffered a cruciate ligament rupture in training and will miss several months.
Source: Fussballdaten
Injury2 Sep 2026
Tim Kleindienst spent less than thirty minutes on the pitch on Tuesday before continuing at the Performance Center, with no injury involved. This is workload management after the trip to Leipzig, where the forward played his first full ninety minutes in more than fifteen months, longer than initially planned. Eugen Polanski specified: “He could have trained with the group,” the reduction simply aiming to build him back up gradually.
Source: LigaInsider
Injury2 Sep 2026
Yukhym Konoplya is progressing in his fitness rehabilitation, according to LigaInsider. The Ukrainian full-back, out for more than a month with a muscle injury, is not yet an option for Elversberg's visit.
Source: LigaInsider
Transfers2 Sep 2026
Tomáš Čvančara is reported to be close to a loan in the Czech Republic. The forward, out for three months with an adductor muscle injury, is no longer in the club's immediate plans and is said to be looking for playing time in his own country.
Source: LigaInsider
Club2 Sep 2026
Gladbach host promoted SV 07 Elversberg on Saturday 5 September at 15:30, in a match already billed as the one to react in after the 0-3 at Leipzig. The projected line-up keeps Moritz Nicolas in goal, a defence built around Kō Itakura and Kevin Diks, and a Tim Kleindienst-Franck Honorat attacking pair. Five players are on the unavailable list: Leopold, Castrop, Čvančara, Konoplya and Hashioka.
Source: LigaInsider
Transfers2 Sep 2026
The club completed a very favourable deal with the one-year loan of winger Nicolas Kühn from Como: no loan fee was paid and the Italian club covers around €3.5m of annual wages. Sporting director Rouven Schröder highlights his attacking versatility and his ability to beat a man one-on-one.
Source: Fussballdaten
Transfers1 Sep 2026
The window closed on some sensitive departures: Rocco Reitz joined RB Leipzig, Nico Elvedi left for Leeds and Giovanni Reyna for Strasbourg, while Ko Itakura arrived from Ajax.
Source: Bundesliga.com
News last verified on 18 Oct 2026. Sources: sports press (L'Équipe, Le Parisien, Foot Mercato, regional press…) and official club websites — see the link on each item.
Editorial content (playing style, mood, absences, external prediction sources) last verified on 3 Sep 2026. The standings/form data above are refreshed automatically — as is the 1/X/2 estimate, recomputed on every view.