The 2024/2025 Bundesliga season kicks off on the 23rd August when defending champions Bayer Leverkusen face off in an away fixture to Borussia Monchengladbach. These are our predictions for the outright winner, top two finish, top four finish, relegation candidates and top goalscorer.
2024/25 Winner
- Bayern Munich
It is hard to look past German giants Bayern Munich as the favourites for the 2024/25 season despite Bayer Leverkusen completing their first ever league title with an unbeaten season. Bayern have made major changes after their first trophyless season since 2011/12 and will be desperate to bounce back. Thomas Tuchel is no longer the coach with Vincent Kompany, the former defender for Hamburg, Manchester City and Belgium taking over at the Allianz Arena. The team has signed Japanese defender Hiroki Ito and extended contracts for young talents Josip Stanišić, who won a title with Leverkusen last season and Arijon Ibrahimović. These moves were made even before the pre-season training started with the aim of bringing the title back to Munich.
It is however the signings of Premier League stars Joao Palhinha and Michael Olise that has been the game changer with both players being key men for Fulham and Crystal Palace respectively. Bayern will again be looking to Harry Kane to lead the attack after he won the Golden Boot in his debut season, falling just five goals short of Robert Lewandowski’s record. The addition of two these creative players could assist Kane in breaking the record although he will need to show a drastic improvement from his performances in the recently concluded Euro Championships. The best odds on Bayern being crowned champions can be found at odds of 1.5
Top two finish
- Bayern Munich
- Bayer Leverkusen
The obvious threat to Bayern for the title will come from the defending champions Bayer Leverkusen who were given a boost when their star players Alejandro Grimaldo and Florian Wirtz agreed to stay on and defend their title. The gap is wide between the top two teams in the league and the rest of the teams so the expected top two will be Bayern and Leverkusen.It will take a Herculean effort for any team to sneak into the top two positions come end of the season.
Top four finish
- Bayern Munich
- Bayer Leverkusen
- RB Leipzig
- Borussia Dortmund
The battle for the top four is going to be furious with the usual suspects Borussia Dortmund and RB Leipzig joined in the race by the surprise package of last season, Stuttgart. The latter only just survived relegation in the 2022/23 season but shocked all and sundry by finishing second, ahead of Bayern Munich. It is difficult to see them repeating last season’s heroics, especially with Dortmund and Leipzig certain to improve this season. Dortmund will be hoping that club legend Nuri Şahin replacing Edin Terzić as head coach will help them improve on their disappointing fifth place finish of last season.
Relegation
The obvious candidates for relegation are generally the teams that get promoted from Bundesliga 2 as was the case with Darmstadt last season. The two new teams this season are St. Pauli and Holstein Kiel with the former returning to top flight football for the first time in 13 years. Kiel will be making their debut in the Bundesliga and will need to be at their very best if they are to retain their status. It will be a difficult task for newcomers St. Pauli as they have lost the services of Coach Fabian Hürzeler who has made his way to take over the reins at Brighton in the Premier League.
St. Pauli
Holstein Kiel
Top scorer
Harry Kane
Harry Kane had a phenomenal debut season as he ran away with the Golden Boot award after scoring 36 goals, beating the next best goalscorer by eight goals. Few will bet against him winning the award again this season and he will definitely be eying Robert Lewandowski record of 41 goals in a season. Last season Stuttgart hitman, Serhou Guirassy showcased his talents to the world as he scored 28 goals to help his side to a sensational second place finish. The real race could be who will finish second especially if Kane can stay fit for the entirety of the season.
