Paderborn vs Werder Bremen 13/06/20

13 June 2020

Paderborn and Werder Bremen go head-to-head at the Benteler Arena in the bottom-of-the-table Bundesliga (BL) clash this weekend.

Rock-bottom visitors have yet to pick up a top-flight victory in the post-pandemic period (D4, L1), scoring under 1.5 goals in each of their five BL matches in May. As a consequence, they trail 15th-placed Mainz by 11 points ahead of the kick-off and are pretty much in a ‘must-win’ situation here. However, it will be a daunting prospect for Paderborn to pick up three points here, at least based on their dismal home performances in 2020. Indeed, Steffen Baumgart’s players have lost all but one of their six BL home outings since the turn of the year (D1), with each of those defeats seeing over 2.5 goals and both teams on the scoresheet. Additionally, the third-slowest home starters in Germany’s top-tier – Paderborn have shipped the opening goal in ten of 15 BL fixtures held at this venue, returning only two points from such matches (D2, L8).

On the other hand, Werder’s brief promising spell (W2, D1) has faded away lately, as they go into this encounter on the back of two successive league defeats, both of which have come ‘to nil.’ Encouragingly, though, the visitors have racked up two identical 1-0 BL away victories ahead of this trip, with the winner across those matches continually coming inside the opening 35 minutes of play. In turn, much more aggressive in the first 45 minutes, ‘Die Werderaner’ have notched up 62% (13) of their 21 BL away goals scored before the halftime whistle. Also, the ‘clean-sheet theme’ will be of the essence here, considering that five of Werder’s last six BL away results (win/loss) have seen the winner on the day shut out the losing side.