Ribery brace gets Bayern back to winning ways

BERLIN: Bayern Munich bounced back from their midweek Champions League defeat in Belarus as France star Franck Ribery scored both goals in their 2-0 win at home to Hoffenheim in the Bundesliga yesterday.
Having lost 3-1 BATE Borisov in Minsk on Tuesday — their first defeat in 10 competitive games this season — Bayern enjoyed a comfortable win at the Allianz Arena with their seventh straight domestic league victory.
With second-placed Eintracht Frankfurt at Borussia Moenchengladbach on Sunday, Bayern took the chance to go five points clear at the top of the table.
Ribery opened the scoring on 19 minutes after Thomas Mueller’s pass down the left.
The Frenchman beat Hoffenheim defender Andreas Beck and fired the ball through the legs of goalkeeper Koen Casteels from eight meters.
Then after some good build up play between striker Mario Mandzukic and midfielder Toni Kroos, Ribery was the fastest to react and beat Casteels again on 47 minutes.
There was no happy return to Gelsenkirchen for Wolfsburg’s ex-Schalke 04 coach Felix Magath as the Royal Blues enjoyed a 3-0 win.
Magath spent two years at Schalke before he was sacked in February 2011 when he returned to Wolfsburg.
Magath’s team were well beaten at Gelsenkirchen’s Veltins Arena thanks to goals by Peru striker Jefferson Farfan, Dutch forward Ibrahim Afellay and midfielder Roman Neustaedter.
It was Wolves’ sixth game without a win and their third straight defeat to leave Magath’s team second from bottom, while Schalke move up to third.
Hamburg continued their rise up the table with a 1-0 win at Bavarian side Greuther Fuerth thanks to South Korean striker Son Heung-Min’s first-half goal.
Since signing Rafael van der Vaart from Premier League side Tottenham Hotspur, Hamburg are undefeated in their last four games and the win in Bavaria leaves Thorsten Fink’s team a healthy eighth.
Mainz enjoyed a 1-0 win at home to Fortuna Duesseldorf, whose goalkeeper Fabian Giefer is making a name for himself having conceded just three goals in seven games this season.
Giefer was beaten by an 85th-minute header from Macedonia midfielder Nikolce Noveski as Duesseldorf suffered their first Bundesliga defeat since winning promotion in May.

Freiburg enjoyed their first win in four games with a 3-0 victory at home to Nuremberg.
Congo midfielder Cedrick Makiadi headed in the first goal in the opening period before the hosts’ defense capitulated late on as Daniel Caligiuri converted a 92nd minute penalty, before Marco Terrazzino netted the third, less than a minute later.
On Friday, Werder Bremen lost 3-1 at Augsburg as the hosts enjoyed their first win of the season.
Today, defending champions Borussia Dortmund are at Hanover while Stuttgart host Leverkusen.