Half the Bundesliga is in the red

League leaders Salzburg miss the spectacle, Austria is behind Iceland or Azerbaijan in the five-year ranking. An interim balance.

The Bundesliga is going into winter break. Data and facts about the fall season.

Unspectacularly successful: His Salzburgers almost never showed the spectacle promised by Gerhard Struber in the fall. 64, 54, 37, 37 and now 34 is the goal tally after 17 rounds over the years. With 3,921 spectators in the stadium, the series champions recently recorded a negative record against the WAC. In terms of results, the Bulls didn’t let themselves be thrown off track, they lead the table two points ahead of Sturm Graz and still have the chance to winter internationally.

Historically weak: Austria Lustenau didn’t get a single point in nine home games in the fall. In addition, Vorarlberg became the fourth team in Bundesliga history after SC Neusiedl/See in 1983, Salzburger AK in 1985 and Vorwärts Steyr in 1995 without a win before the winter break. There are three meager points, the gap to the penultimate WSG Tirol is already eight points. The search for a new coach has been unsuccessful for weeks. The savior should be found by Christmas.

Small number(s): After years of highs, the Bundesliga is facing a crash in the UEFA five-year rankings. Points are missing, which were mainly won by the now Champions League team from Salzburg for years in the Europa League. LASK and Sturm missed out on highs one floor below, Rapid and Austria failed to qualify for the Conference League. In the annual ranking, Austria is only in 23rd place – behind Iceland and Azerbaijan.

Violet Red Tide: Wiener Austria players had to leave the field involuntarily seven times in the fall at the behest of the referees. Marvin Martins saw two straight reds, Lucas Galvao saw two yellow-reds. Matthias Braunöder was also sent off once with a straight red, while James Holland had to go to yellow and red. The purple flood of exclusions didn’t stop at the bench: Austria’s assistant coach Ahmet Koc was also sent to the stands with red once. Most of the boxes were thrown at Luca Kronberger from WSG Tirol and Mike Bähre from Altach. Both were shown yellow cards seven times each.

The financial situation: Half the league is in the red. In the last financial year, Salzburg generated 186.82 million euros, more than four times as much as its toughest (economic) pursuers Sturm Graz and Rapid, and here too, with a profit of 32 million, it was in its own cosmos. After selling millions, Sturm Graz invested heavily, leaving two million left. Austria Lustenau, Altach, WAC and Rapid came in behind. Austria again stood out negatively, with a loss of 6.85 million euros. In addition to the Violets, there were also millions in losses for LASK (-3.74 million euros), Austria Klagenfurt (-1.92 million) and Hartberg (-1.06 million). Newly promoted Blau-Weiß Linz and WSG Tirol also made losses.

Continuity: The trend has been confirmed that there is no unconditional “hire and fire” mentality in the coaching position. Overall, as in the previous year, only three clubs have changed coaches since the start of the season. One day before the first game, Red Bull Salzburg showed consistency and released Matthias Jaissle. The master reacted to the apparently already advanced negotiations of the young German, who followed the call of the millions from Saudi Arabia to Al-Ahly. Gerhard Struber took over. Two more coaching changes followed in the fall. On November 13th, Markus Mader had to leave the winless bottom team Austria Lustenau, two days later Rapid parted ways with Zoran Barisic and hired Robert Klauß.

Fire and flame: Sturm’s supporters made it onto social media channels worldwide thanks to excessive fireworks in the cup final against Rapid at the end of April. In mid-September, the Graz fans caused a minute-long interruption against Salzburg with rockets and Bengal fire. At Rapid, a little more than a week later, the “Ultras” celebrated their existence so much that there was a ten-minute break. The league responded with high fines (100,000 or 50,000 euros), and Rapid has to fear that points will be deducted in the event of another incident. The pyro show in the cup home game against Red Bull Salzburg also had an unpleasant aftermath for Austria Salzburg. The regional league team was fined over 34,000 euros. The fans want to pay for the majority of the amount.

LASK life insurance: Robert Zulj is the life and soul of LASK. In their most recent five league games without the offensive man, the Linzers have only picked up a single point across the seasons. With the captain on board, however, things went brilliantly. In the fall, Zulj scored seven goals and five assists in 15 games. Only Sinan Karweina from Austria Klagenfurt has more scorer points (eight goals and six assists).

Wolfsbergs “Ba-Ba-Bo”: The Lavanttal attack trio kept the opposing defenses busy enough. Thierno Ballo, Mohamed Bamba and Augustine Boakye scored 16 times in total, sharing their goals almost fraternally with a ratio of 5-6-5. It was only from the 13th lap onwards that the French-speaking trio were always in the field together right from the start. With a total of 23 WAC goals, Ballo, Bamba and Boakye scored a rate of almost 70 percent of them.