Werder Bremen against FC Bayern Munich, VfB Stuttgart against Borussia Dortmund: The best four teams in the Bundesliga’s all-time table are among themselves on the fourth matchday. The figures for 58 clubs show that 1. FC Cologne is in for a bitter season.
There is no television money to be earned in the all-time table, nor does it serve as a criterion for qualifying for competitions. There are even two versions. One is calculated according to the old model, with two plus or minus points for a win and a loss, and one point for a draw. The modern and generally accepted all-time table calculates three points for a win and one for a draw.
With 1,215 wins and 431 draws from 2,013 Bundesliga matches, that gives the league leader FC Bayern 4,076 points. Theoretically, the Munich team should not get a single point from now on, would have to be relegated and stay in the second division, while Borussia Dortmund would have to win the next 309 matches and become champions nine years in a row to catch up with Bayern.
As far as anyone can tell, no one alive today will see the Munich team pushed out of the top spot. It will also take quite a long time for Werder Bremen to catch up with BVB, if it ever happens. Although Dortmund have played 68 fewer games, they have picked up 180 more points.
When BVB takes on VfB Stuttgart on Sunday (September 22, 2024), both clubs will be playing their 1,938th Bundesliga game in their history. The Westphalians averaged 1.63 points per game, the Swabians 1.47.
Leverkusen still needs 37 points to overtake Cologne
The best current second division team in the all-time table is Hamburger SV in sixth place with a clear lead over FC Schalke 04, who will most likely have to vacate their place this season. Eintracht Frankfurt only needs to get 22 points from 31 games to overtake the Gelsenkirchen team.
| Platz | Association | Games | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
For some clubs, there are huge gaps in the all-time table. For example, 1. FC Kaiserslautern, in eleventh place, is 353 points behind Bayer Leverkusen, who are in front of them. The buffer to the next current Bundesliga team, VfL Bochum, in 13th place, is as much as 610 points.
So it will be a long time before 1. FC Kaiserslautern moves. Before that, however, there will probably be a shift that will be more than a side note on both sides of the Rhine. The current German champions will overtake 1. FC Cologne, the first Bundesliga champions and title holders in 1978, by another 37 points.
Theoretically, of the current Bundesliga teams, Borussia Mönchengladbach (currently 5th), VfL Wolfsburg (15th), SC Freiburg (19th), TSG Hoffenheim (24th), RB Leipzig (27th), FC Augsburg (28th), FC St. Pauli (33rd), 1. FC Union Berlin (34th), 1. FC Heidenheim (50th) and Holstein Kiel can also move up at least one place.
As a Bundesliga debutant, Kiel are in 58th place with zero points and are therefore last. Ten points are needed to overtake Tasmania Berlin thanks to the then certainly better goal difference.
