Bundesliga week 16: Goals galore in Germany

Be prepared, Bundesliga fans -- the matches recommended during this midweek slate are the ones you’re likely to have difficulty finding on your TV box. That’s because often the TV box can’t sense what games are going to thrill, and what games are predestined to be a 1-0 victory by Bayern.

Of course, now these matches are all likely to end in scoreless draws, signifying the coming apocalypse. Still, give ‘em a try.

Sure, this is the match most likely to end without a goal, but it’s also the one that might have repercussions rippling through the second half of the season. A win for Stuttgart could see them out of the relegation places -- temporarily at least -- whereas if HSV take three points, they could conceivably move up to mid-table. Not bad for a team whose current two-game unbeaten run counts as one of their strongest moments of the season. But, perhaps surprisingly, Stuttgart are quite good on the road, able to keep the goals flowing and pick up points. So despite this hot streak of Hamburg’s, this match could be tipped in the bottom side’s favor.

A mere glance at the table should tell you calling this result is a cinch: second-place team travels to a side struggling against relegation, one that’s managed to score just seven goals in their own stadium. Yet this is Dortmund. We may be nearly halfway through the season, yet there’s still the sense that they’re going to snap back into contention. They finished top of their Champions League group, after all, so BVB must still have a bit of that impressive talent lying under the surface. Even if they can’t buy a win in the Bundesliga -- which is likely a sensitive subject for Wolfsburg, who were more or less cheated out of three points against Paderborn over the weekend, BVB may be eager to prove themselves worthy of second place.

In all honesty, though, you should probably forego watching Dortmund’s limping shadows and focus on this match. On one hand, you’ve got Hoffenheim, scorer of 24 goals and conceder of the same. On the other, Leverkusen, another side almost as likely to let goals in as they are to score them. Two squads eager to press high, attack in swarms and ignore the dreary demands of defending. Even if both teams manage, somehow, not to score, it’ll likely enthrall anyway.