The Football Faithful
·24 April 2024
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Yahoo sportsThe Football Faithful
·24 April 2024
Bayer Leverkusen continue to chase history with Xabi Alonso’s team having produced a stunning season in German football.
Leverkusen have been crowned Bundesliga champions for the first time in their 120-year history this season and achieved the feat with five games to spare, toppling the dynasty of Bayern Munich.
Alonso’s side have not lost a single game in all competitions in 2023/24, and are chasing a Bundesliga, DFB-Pokal and Europa League treble while remaining undefeated.
No team in Europe’s top five leagues has ever completed an entire campaign without losing in all competitions and we’ve decided to look at the longest unbeaten runs from teams in England, Germany, Spain, Italy and France.
Real Madrid went 40 games without defeat across two separate seasons, a run that stretched from April 2016 to January 2017.
The Spanish side’s final defeat before that run came with a 2-0 loss to Wolfsburg in the Champions League’s quarter-finals, though a Cristiano Ronaldo-inspired side progressed as the forward hit a hat-trick in the second leg to seal an aggregate triumph.
Real Madrid went on to win the Champions League under Zinedine Zidane, beating Atletico Madrid on penalties in the final, and started the 2016/17 campaign with a 29-game run without defeat.
Their first loss of the campaign came at Sevilla on January 15, as Stevan Jovetić hit a stoppage-time winner to bring Real’s run to an end.
Inter Milan also went 40 games without defeat in all competitions over two seasons. After losing to Lecce in May 2004, the Nerazzurri’s next defeat did not arrive until February 27, 2005, after a 1-0 reverse at home to AC Milan.
Inter opened the 2004/05 Serie A season with a 25-game unbeaten run, though incredibly drew 16 of those games, including a run of seven consecutive league draws. Roberto Mancini’s side finished third in the table.
Juventus are one of just two teams, alongside Arsenal in 2003/04, to complete an entire league season without defeat in one of Europe’s top five leagues this century.
Antonio Conte’s side won their first legitimate title since 2003 and first since promotion back into Serie A after the Calciopoli scandal, doing so without losing a game.
The Bianconeri won 23 and drew 15 of their 38 league games, with the club’s only defeat of the season coming in the Coppa Italia final against Napoli.
Bayer Leverkusen have set a new record for unbeaten games in all competitions across Europe’s top five leagues, with Xabi Alonso’s side preserving their undefeated season with a 97th-minute equaliser against Borussia Dortmund last weekend.
Die Werkself have shed their unwanted ‘Neverkusen’ tag in astonishing fashion this season, ending Bayern Munich’s 11-year dominance of the Bundesliga to win the first league title in the club’s history.
A DFB-Pokal final against second-tier FC Kaiserslautern awaits next month, while Leverkusen will take on AS Roma in the Europa League semi-finals in May. A treble is on for Alonso’s record-breaking outfit, who are four games from becoming the first-ever Bundesliga team to complete a league season without defeat.
Unbelievably, this is Alonso’s first full season in senior management.