National player Jonas Hofmann has been at the top since moving to Leverkusen.
Photo: image/Team2
Jonas Hofmann’s all-rounder qualities on the football field are now well known. A few weeks ago, the Heidelberg native tried his hand at a different area for a change – when he appeared as a curator at the Morsbroich Museum in Leverkusen. For the exhibition “to be & to have,” which is currently on view there, the offensive player, like nine other people, designed a room based on his own taste in art. And one of the four works he chose from the museum’s collection includes a picture showing a high mountain range.
“Climbing a mountain,” Hofmann said, “is a big dream of mine.” And the 31-year-old has big dreams, especially in his everyday job. Before last Sunday’s home game against Frankfurt, just a quick look at the north curve was enough. “Just one wish, year after year, one day it will come true,” was written across the entire stand. And right in the middle of their banner, the Bayer Leverkusen fans had placed an image of the championship trophy.
Her team is now one win further. As a reward for the confident 3-0 win over Eintracht, the title of Christmas champion was given for the third Advent. The next stage should be climbed this Wednesday in the home game against Bochum and in the first round final in mid-January in Augsburg: If Leverkusen also win these two games, they will at least be winter champions. Bayern, who still have three games left in the first half of the season including the catch-up game against Union Berlin, can struggle as they please.
This scenario is entirely to Hofmann’s taste. But the man with 22 international matches in the uniform of the German Football Association (DFB) doesn’t stop mentally at just half a title. Ultimately, he accepted the nasty comments from some Mönchengladbach fans who accompanied his move from Borussia to the factory club this summer with a clear plan in mind. “One of my big goals is to lift a trophy after the season,” emphasized Leverkusen’s ten million euro purchase immediately after his arrival at the Dhünn. And when asked specifically about the championship title, he said a few days before Christmas: “I think a title is on everyone’s wish list.”
The Leverkusen team will not be deterred by the prospect of having to send up to five of their professionals to the Africa Cup of Nations in Côte d’Ivoire in January. Above all, the absence of the extremely reliable central defenders Edmond Tapsoba (Burkina Faso) and Odilon Kossounou (Côte d’Ivoire) as well as the Nigerian center forward Victor Boniface, the league’s top scorer and in third place on the scorer list with nine league goals plus eight assists, could hurt. But coach Xabi Alonso doesn’t want to know anything about it.
“I do not cry. I am not a victim. We’ve always said that we have many, many good players,” the head coach relies on the high quality of the squad beyond the starting eleven – and on a player like Jonas Hofmann. »He is a super intelligent player and almost always makes the right decision about what to do with the ball. And he has the intuition to get into a good position in the penalty area,” said Señor Alonso during the season so far. While Hofmann – with five goals and seven assists, is tied with left-back Alejandro Grimaldo as the team’s second-best scorer – raves about the Spanish coach’s uncomplicated way of working.
So he recently thanked Alonso “uncannily” for his clear and extremely targeted instructions to the team. »There are so many simple but effective things. That’s what counts in football. The way we play it from the back opens up so many possibilities for us,” explains the kicker for the Leverkusen ensemble, which has been undefeated in 24 competitive games so far.
In the last defeat, a 3-0 loss in the season finale at Wednesday’s opponents Bochum, Hofmann was still in Gladbach’s service. Seven months have passed since then – and now thoughts of possible trophies are becoming increasingly more of a focus for him too. “We have high expectations of ourselves,” the linguistically savvy leisure curator mentions in this context – and adds, quite simply: “None of us will say ‘no’ if we can hold something up at the end of the season.”
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