Bundesliga 2022-23 season preview

Bol News brings you a detailed view about what to expect from the upcoming season in German football

The new season of the Bundesliga is set to begin on August five where Bayern Munich will be once again defending their crow.

Bol News brings you the preview for the upcoming edition of top-tier football in Germany.

Bayern Munich

Bayern Munich will start the campaign as firm favourites once again, despite losing their prolific striker in Robert Lewandowski who ended up joining Barcelona.

The club have made some incredible signings including winger Sadio Mane from Liverpool, midfielder Ryan Gravenberch from Ajax and centre-back Matthijs de Ligt from Italian club Juventus.

If everything goes to plan, despite losing the Poland international, Bayern will have enough in their tank to trouble all the other teams in the division.

Borussia Dortmund

Borussia Dortmund had a mixed campaign last time around where they did finish in the second spot in the Bundesliga but hardly managed to put any fight to the eventual winners.

This season is likely going to be an even tougher one as they’ve already lost star striker Erling Haaland to Manchester City whereas his replacement Sébastien Haller is almost certain to miss a major chunk of the first half of the season after being diagnosed with tumour.

However, the fans will be pleased to see the club strengthening the defensive unit with the arrival of Nico Schlotterbeck and Niklas Süle.

Therefore, it will be interesting to see how Dortmund will challenge the dominance of Bayern this time around.

RB Leipzig

RB Leipzig had a disappointing campaign last time around where they finished on the fourth position in the points table, 19 points behind leaders Bayern.

The fans will be fearing for worse as the team have already lost some key players including centre-back Nordi Mukiele to Paris Saint-Germain, strikers Brian Brobbey to Ajax, Hee-chan Hwang to Wolves and defensive midfielder Tyler Adams to Leeds United.

On the other hand, they are yet to make a blockbuster signing as their most prominent inductee is defensive midfielder Xaver Schlager from Wolfsburg in a deal worth €12 million.

Therefore, the fans will be hoping that things will change from now till the end of the transfer window if they are to compete for more for the title in the upcoming campaign.

FC Köln

FC Köln are coming off the back of an impressive campaign where they finished in the seventh position in the league table with 52 points.

However, the club has refrained from making any sort of big signings despite letting go of an important player like defensive midfielder Salih Özcan who joined Borussia Dortmund in a deal worth €5 million.

FC Köln’s biggest signing thus far is centre-back Luca Kilian who joined from league rivals 1.FSV Mainz 05 in a deal worth €2 million.

It will be interesting to see whether manager Steffen Baumgart will be able to bring in any player before the end of the transfer window or else, it is very hard to predict that Die Geißböcke will be able to produce anything better than what they’ve done in the previous campaign.

VfB Stuttgart

VfB Stuttgart managed to narrowly escape relegation in the previous campaign where they finished in the 15th position of the league table with 33 points, equalled with 16th-placed Hertha Berlin but had a superior goal difference.

Despite having so many difficulties last time around, the club have not invested like the fans would’ve expected and their most expensive signing in the ongoing transfer window thus far is right-back Josha Vagnoman’s arrival from Hertha Berlin in a deal worth €3.7 million.

He is a direct replacement of right-back Pablo Maffeo who joined Spanish La Liga outfit RCD Mallorca in a deal worth €3 million.

With such little investment overall, Stuttgart fans must be prepared for another relegation battle.

TSG 1899 Hoffenheim

Hoffenheim had a mixed campaign last time around where they managed to finish in the ninth position in the league table with 46 points.

To improve that, the club have made some important signings including Turkey’s international centre-back Ozan Kabak in a deal worth €7 million from league rivals FC Schalke 04.

Overall, the side look pretty decent compared to the last season and manager André Breitenreiter will be hoping to improve the team’s standing in the upcoming campaign.

FC Augsburg

Augsburg are coming off the back of a difficult campaign where they narrowly managed to escape relegation and finished in the 14th position in the league table with 38 points.

The club’s most expensive signing this summer has been midfielder Arne Maier from Hertha Berlin in a deal worth €5 million.

By the look of the squad, there isn’t any reason to be optimistic about and therefore, the fans must be ready for another season where the team is likely to be hovering around the relegation battle.

1.FC Union Berlin

Union Berlin are coming off an outstanding season where they achieved much more than anyone expected. They finished in the fifth position on the points table with 57 points.

The most expensive signing for Die Eisernen has been striker Jordan Siebatcheu who arrived from BSC Young Boys in a deal worth €6 million.

However, they’ve lost their star performer of the previous campaign Taiwo Awoniyi who joined Premier League side Nottingham Forest in a deal worth €20.50m.

Therefore, it will be interesting to see whether the side will be able to cope without the services of the player who scored 15 league goals in the last season.

SV Werder Bremen

Werder Bremen are one of the teams to get promoted after spending the last season in the second division. The side will face VfL Wolfsburg in the opening fixture on August 6.

In terms of the transfer window, Bremen remained focused on strengthening the back line with the signing of centre-backs Niklas Stark, Amos Pieper, left-back Lee Buchanan, right-back Mitchell Weiser and defensive midfielder Dikeni Salifou.

Therefore, the fans will be hoping that the arrival of all these players will provide much-needed stability at the back end of the pitch.

VfL Wolfsburg

VfL Wolfsburg had a rather disappointing season last time around where they finished on the 12th position in the points table with 42 points.

To address that issue, the club have made some important additions to the squad including winger Jakub Kaminski, who arrived from Polish club Lech Poznan in a deal worth €10 million.

Another important addition to the squad is the signing of midfielder Mattias Svanberg who arrived from Serie A outfit Bologna in a deal worth €9 million.

With the addition of these players and the departure of not many, the fans will be hoping for a much better time in the upcoming season.

VfL Bochum

VfL Bochum are coming off the back of a good first season in the Bundesliga where they avoided relegation and finished in the 13th position in the points table.

However, the fans will be concerned with the fact that the club have not made the kind of acquisitions that was expected of them after securing another season in top-flight football.

Their most expensive signing is attacking midfielder Philipp Förster who arrived from VfB Stuttgart in a deal worth €500,000.

SC Freiburg

SC Freiburg are coming off the back of a very good season where they finished in the sixth position in the points table with 55 points.

To solidify those results, the club have made some notable signings including winger Ritsu Doan who joined the club from Dutch outfit PSV Eindhoven in a deal worth €8.5 million.

However, they have lost their best centre-back Nico Schlotterbeck to Borussia Dortmund in a deal worth €20 million and it will be interesting to see whether they will be able to cope up without him in the upcoming campaign.

Bayer 04 Leverkusen

Bayer Leverkusen had an extremely good campaign last time around where they finished in the third spot in the league table with 64 points.

To solidify the results, the club has not only kept all of the key players but have also made some important signings including striker Adam Hlozek who joined the club in a deal worth €13 million from Sparta Prague.

Hertha Berlin

Hertha Berlin had a very difficult campaign last time around where they narrowly escaped relegation. However, the fans will be concerned about the lack of activity in the transfer market.

By the look of it, the hierarchy has decided to trust the players who have returned to the club after spending loans elsewhere and it will be interesting to see whether that policy will be good enough to keep the club out of the relegation battle this year.

1.FSV Mainz 05

FSV Mainz 05 had an average campaign last time around where they finished in the eighth position on the points table with 46 points.

The club’s transfer activity has not been that impressive as they’ve already lost their two star centre-backs — Moussa Niakhaté who joined Nottingham Forest in a deal worth €10 million and Jeremiah St. Juste who joined Sporting in a deal worth €9.5 million.

In terms of incomings, Mainz’s most notable signing is attacking midfielder Angelo Fulgini who joined the club from the French side Angers SCO in a deal worth €5 million.

FC Schalke 04

Schalke are one of the teams to have returned to the Bundesliga after playing the last campaign in the second division.

The club’s hierarchy are more focused on signing more attacking players and it will be interesting to see how they will cope, especially after the departure of their star centre-back Kabak.

Their opening fixture is against 1. FC Köln away from home on August 7.

Eintracht Frankfurt

Eintracht Frankfurt are coming off the back of an impressive campaign where they won the Europa League which means they will be playing in the UEFA Champions League next season, despite finishing 11th in the league campaign.

Frankfurt’s focus in this transfer window is to strengthen the attacking front and they have already made a number of impressive signings including winger Jens Petter Hauge from AC Milan, striker Lucas Alario from Bayer Leverkusen and World Cup-winning midfielder Mario Gotze from PSV Eindhoven.

Borussia Mönchengladbach

Borussia Mönchengladbach had an average campaign last time around where they finished in the 10th position with 45 points.

The fans will be extremely concerned going into the next season as their club have lost key players in striker Breel Embolo, central midfielder László Bénes and centre-back Matthias Ginter.

Their most notable inclusion has been defensive midfielder Ko Itakura who joined the club from Manchester City in a deal worth €5 million.

*All figures are taken from Transfermarkt