Football
ESPN staff 7y

Bayern Munich win as Leipzig hand Hoffenheim their first Bundesliga loss

Bundesliga leaders Bayern Munich produced another uninspired performance but managed to win 2-1 at Werder Bremen.

The visitors went ahead just after the half-hour mark, when Franck Ribery ran at the Bremen defense and crossed for fellow winger Arjen Robben to score with a brilliant left-footed strike inside the post.

David Alaba did even better to make it 2-0 at the break with a free kick, stroking the ball over the wall into the top right corner and in off the post.

Home fans must have feared a repeat of the 6-0 drubbing Bayern gave Bremen on the opening weekend of the season, but it was as good as it got from Bayern.

Bremen's Max Kruse displayed a wonderful turn of foot to elude Alaba after taking Zlatko Junuzovic's cross before rifling the ball into the roof of the net in the 53rd minute.

Bayern, who were similarly short of ideas against Freiburg the previous weekend, maintained their three-point lead over Leipzig, who handed Hoffenheim their first league defeat, 2-1.

Hoffenheim, who had been the last unbeaten team across Europe's five biggest leagues, stunned the home side with Nadiem Amiri's opener on a counter-attack led by Sebastian Rudy in the 18th minute. Rudy found Kerem Demirbay, and the ball worked its way to Amiri and then Andrej Kramaric, who had the vision to return the ball for his teammate to score.

Timo Werner equalised minutes before the break, taking the ball from Keita and prodding the ball past Oliver Baumann after Hoffenheim failed to clear.

Both sides pressed hard with Germany coach Joachim Low watching in the stands, but Leipzig were handed the advantage with half an hour remaining when Sandro Wagner was sent off for a stamp on Stefan Ilsanker.

Marcel Sabitzer struck the winner with just over 10 minutes remaining, with Keita again involved before he scored with a deflected shot.

Lars Stindl scored a second-half brace as Borussia Monchengladbach came from two goals down to beat Bayer Leverkusen 3-2.

Javier Hernandez and Jonathan Tah had put the hosts ahead and seemingly in control of the match at half-time, but two goals in seven minutes turned the game.

Stindl hit his seventh and eighth goals of the season before Raffael buried the winner with 20 minutes to go, and the visitors held out for a first win in four.

Dominik Kohr scored in the second half to give Augsburg a 2-1 win at Wolfsburg.

Mario Gomez headed Wolfsburg into an early lead -- though replays showed he was offside -- before Halil Altintop equalised in unusual fashion 20 minutes later. A poor back-pass forced Diego Benaglio to clear, but Altintop intercepted and headed the ball off the crossbar before converting at the second attempt on the rebound.

Kohr claimed what proved the visitors' winner with just over 20 minutes remaining -- plenty of time for the home fans to make their displeasure known at the ninth defeat.

Ingolstadt are out of the bottom two after a 3-1 win against Hamburg saw them leapfrog their opponents.

Goals from Pascal Gross and Markus Suttner in the opening 22 minutes were followed by Almog Cohen's penalty early in the second half.

Gotoku Sakai pulled one back for the visitors but Hamburg's third defeat in four games drops them to 17th place.

Darmstadt remain firmly rooted to the bottom of the table after being thrashed 6-1 at home by Cologne.

Yuya Osako scored twice for Cologne, who earned a first win since November, while Aytac Sulu scored an own goal and Anthony Modeste, Milos Jojic and Artjoms Rudnevs also found the target.

Sidney Sam's second-half penalty was a mere consolation as the basement boys suffered a ninth defeat in 10 games which leaves them four points behind Hamburg and six adrift of Ingolstadt.

Information from The Associated Press and Press Association Sport was used in this report.

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