Bayer Leverkusen have charged into title contention with a run of seven straight division wins. bundesliga.com looks at what is going right for the Bundesliga champions.

Xabi Alonso's men may certainly find it tough to maintain their current form having not tasted defeat in any competition since 5 November. A draw and 10 successive wins in all competitions have followed, with their notable league run narrowing the nine-point gap between themselves and leaders Bayern Munich to just four points. It will be tricky, but they have done it before….

A key reason for the Werkself's upturn in fortunes is simple: they are scoring more goals, and conceding fewer. In the first 10 games this season, they had lost just once, but had recorded five draws. That is because, though they had scored 21 times, they had let in 16, too often turning what should have been three points into just one. In the last seven matches, Bayer 04 have found the net 20 times, but conceded just seven - only Bayern with six have conceded fewer in that time.

Watch: Leverkusen down Mainz on Matchday 18

Yes, they have already conceded 23 times this season - just one shy of their incredibly miserly total for the whole title-winning campaign - but there is no doubt Alonso's team have tightened up significantly as their aggressive gameplan has finally clicked into place.

"Today, we had control without the ball," said Alonso after the 3-2 win at Borussia Dortmund on Matchday 16 that was earned with just 30 per cent possession. "I like this way of winning. It's important that we have the confidence to play that way."

"We don't always have to have the ball," added captain Lukáš Hrádecký, who has played behind a back three and a back four this season.

The form and ability of Piero Hincapié to play in different positions in the backline has helped too. After a frustrating 2023/24 in which he made just 16 starts in 26 Bundesliga appearances, the departure of Odilon Kossounou and Hincapié's versatility has earned the Ecuador international greater first-team opportunities this term.

Watch: B04 start 2025 with a win in Dortmund 

About the players

1

Lukáš

Hrádecký

Bayer 04 Leverkusen

14

Patrik

Schick

Bayer 04 Leverkusen

Want more Bundesliga Action?

GET THE UPDATES!

"Impressive," was how Hrádecký described Hincapié's display against Dortmund. "He has made the next step, he's become a leader. I can only say good things about him." Alonso too, even if the Leverkusen boss laughed when he heard that Hincapié is nicknamed "El Kaiser" in his native country. "For me," said the former Liverpool and Real Madrid midfielder. "He's more a fighter ("Kämpfer" in German) than a Kaiser."

For all their increased defensive solidity, Leverkusen have still only kept three clean sheets this season - they had as many in the first seven games of 2023/24 - but they are scoring enough goals at the opposite end for it not to matter too much.

When Victor Boniface suffered a serious hamstring injury in mid-November, Leverkusen had looked like they might be in real trouble. The Nigeria international got 14 goals in 23 top-flight appearances last season, and had six in 10 before heading to the treatment room and leaving the goalscoring burden on the shoulders of Patrik Schick.

Watch: Schick - Leverkusen's unsung hero 

The Czech Republic forward had scored just 10 goals across the previous two Bundesliga seasons due to his own injury problems, and had made only one start and seven very brief appearances until he had to be thrown in at the deep end at Bochum on Matchday 10. Since, Schick hasn't sunk, nor even swum. He has walked on water with his 11 goals coming in six games at a rate of one every 51 minutes, including a hat-trick against Heidenheim, four against Freiburg and two in the win at Dortmund.

"I know he was great in the season before I came to Leverkusen," said Alonso referring to Schick's 24-goal Bundesliga campaign of 2021/24. "Now he's scoring goals, and not just at Dortmund but he also did very well in the games in December. Not only with his goals but also his defensive work. The intensity of our forward pressing well is very important for our stability. He knows how important it is to have that positive influence on our defensive game."

His coach may be happy, but - like all good strikers - it is the one chance that got away that keeps Schick up at night (quite literally) and bodes well for the hunger to keep on scoring he will show in the remainder of Leverkusen's season. "I have to say I'm not very happy," said Schick, referring to the great opportunity he failed to take at Dortmund with the score at 3-1. "I couldn't score a third goal and perhaps that will mean I won't sleep well tonight."

Picture perfect: Schick is in frame to challenge for scoring honours this term. - Christian Kaspar-Bartke/Bundesliga

With Boniface and fellow forward Amine Adli close to long-awaited returns, Alonso will have options and significant competition for places across the front line, all of which is unlikely to reduce his team's firepower. Allied with their renewed winning mentality, which saw them grind their way to victory against Mainz thanks to Alejandro Grimaldo's superb free-kick, the question is: who can stop the Bundesliga champions?

"When we play like that and get such a good result, everything is possible," said Hrádecký after the Dortmund game, while Alonso resorted to post-match cliché to remind his team that if they want to retain their title, they simply need to keep their form going.

"The table? It's just a picture. We don't get anything for the position we are in now. We're not going to the Champions League because we are now second. There's still a lot of games," he told bundesliga.com after ticking off the Mainz match. "What I like is that I've seen a development of the team over the last couple of months, so we want to keep this level. This is our level, I think. It's going to be tough, it's so demanding to play every three days. But we'll try to do it."

About the clubs

Bayer 04 Leverkusen

BayArena