Hoffenheim's home game against Olympiacos was also the last game of the Champions League round of 16 this season. After the game, all the rosters for the 2009/2010 Champions League quarter-finals have been decided.
The teams that finally advanced to the quarterfinals were Hoffenheim, Bayern Munich, Manchester United, Arsenal, Barcelona, Inter Milan, Lyon and CSKA Moscow.
Real Madrid was really eliminated by Lyon in the round of 16, and was eliminated in the round of 16 of the Champions League for the sixth consecutive season. The title of the 16th place in the Champions League is becoming more and more well-deserved.
On March 18, 2010, the day after the competition, UEFA held the draw ceremony for the quarter-finals.
Hoffenheim was lucky again and drew Lyon from Ligue 1.
This is not the weakest team among the top eight, but it is obviously much easier to deal with than Manchester United, Barcelona, Inter Milan, Arsenal and other teams.
In Hoffenheim's first season in the Champions League, Lu Wenbin made his Champions League debut and it felt like UEFA was always helping Hoffenheim advance.
The other matches are Bayern Munich vs Manchester United, Inter Milan vs CSKA Moscow, and Arsenal vs Barcelona.
Except for Inter Milan which is slightly more relaxed, it is not easy for the other four giants fighting against each other.
The media generally believe that Hoffenheim and Inter Milan will advance to the semi-finals, but no one is sure about the remaining two semi-final spots.
After the draw ceremony, Hoffenheim ushered in the 27th round of the Bundesliga amid heated discussions among the media and fans.
On March 20, in the 27th round of the Bundesliga, Hoffenheim challenged Nuremberg away.
For Hoffenheim, the schedule of fighting on three fronts is really very tight.
Three days after this away league game, there will be the semi-final of the German Cup.
The points lead in the league is huge, but the German Cup is a one-match decision.
Now that they have reached the semi-finals, Hoffenheim will naturally aim for the final and the championship and will not be careless about the German Cup.
Therefore, in the away league game against Nuremberg, Ralph only brought a rotation lineup of half main players and half substitutes, allowing some main players to rest and prepare for the German Cup semi-final.
For Nuremberg, who are playing at home, they will naturally give it their all.
After the first 26 rounds, Nuremberg ranked fourth from the bottom, only 1 point away from the relegation zone of the last three, and the relegation situation was very serious.
Therefore, Nuremberg players fought very hard in this game.
It is true that the relegation team is weak, but it is not easy to beat them when they fight hard.
The same is true for this game.
Hoffenheim, who played with half main players and half substitutes, finally won 2-1 narrowly away from home, with both goals coming from Lu Wenbin.
But the price of victory was that Gustavo and Paljic were injured and Yaisle was sent off with a red card.
Fortunately, Ralph made rotations in advance, and Hoffenheim does not lack a starting lineup for the next German Cup game.
Lu Wenbin, who scored two goals, received 20,000 experience points for two goals and 20,000 for winning, for a total of 40,000 experience points. The system experience points increased to level 17, 4.855 million/5 million.
After the game, Lu Wenbin received a lot of media coverage.
Because of Lu Wenbin's two goals in this away game, his total number of goals in his career at Hoffenheim has reached 200.
And he scored these 200 goals in just 106 games.
Lu Wenbin has undoubtedly become the top scorer in Hoffenheim's history, and it is estimated that it will be difficult for anyone to surpass him for a long time, even if others have played longer than Lu Wenbin and played more games than Lu Wenbin.
It is really because Lu Wenbin's goal efficiency is too high. He averages about 1.9 goals per game, which is unmatched in the world of football.
With such performance, some people even said that even if Lu Wenbin could not win the Champions League this year or participate in the World Cup, the FIFA Ballon d'Or, which is a merger of the European Ballon d'Or and the World Footballer of the Year, would be awarded to Lu Wenbin.
It is really that Lu Wenbin's personal performance was so dazzling that in the eyes of many people it has surpassed the collective honor.
Of course, if Lu Wenbin can win the Champions League, or even lead Hoffenheim to a treble, then the Golden Ball will be more secure.
Amid countless people's heated discussions and worship of Lu Wenbin, on March 23, in the semi-finals of the 2009/2010 German Football Association Cup, Hoffenheim welcomed their opponent Augsburg at home.
The German second division team Augsburg was the dark horse of this season's German Cup, eliminating Bundesliga teams such as Freiburg and Cologne along the way to advance to the semi-finals.
However, Augsburg's dark horse journey came to an end when they faced Hoffenheim, who almost fielded all their main players and gave their all at the Rhein-Neckar Arena.
In the first half alone, Hoffenheim, who gave their all, scored three goals against Augsburg amid the cheers of the home fans.
In the second half, Hoffenheim continued their efforts and scored two more goals, eventually defeating Augsburg 5-1 at home and advancing to the final.
Augsburg scored a face-saving goal in the final stages of the game, after Ralph had already substituted Lu Wenbin and Eduardo.
In this game, Lu Wenbin scored two goals in open play and a free kick, completing a hat trick, and was rewarded with 3 goals 6,000 + win 4,000, a total of 10,000 experience points, and the experience points increased to level 17, 4.865 million/5 million.
The next day, another German Cup semi-final was decided. Bayern Munich tied Schalke 04 0-0 in 90 minutes, and relied on a goal in overtime to eliminate Schalke 04 1-0 in 120 minutes to advance to the final.
Following the 2007/2008 season, Hoffenheim once again met Bayern Munich in the German Cup final.
Whether Hoffenheim will continue to step on the corpses of the Bundesliga giants to win the German Cup for three consecutive times, or whether Bayern Munich will defeat Hoffenheim, will only be revealed on the German Cup final day on May 15.
After the German Cup semi-finals, on March 28, in the 28th round of the Bundesliga, Hoffenheim faced Freiburg at home.
Because the first leg of the Champions League quarter-final against Lyon will be played away from home in just three days.
Therefore, this league was strategically abandoned by Ralph.
Even Lu Wenbin was put on the bench by Ralph for the first time. Even though Lu Wenbin said that he had no physical problems, Ralph put him on the bench for the reason of preventing injury.
Ralph didn't know that Lu Wenbin had no tendency to get injured, and Freiburg was a relegation team deep in the relegation zone, ranked second from the bottom.
Gustavo and Paljic were injured in the last round against relegation team Nuremberg, so Ralph doesn't want to take any risks.
With the team still nearly 10 points ahead of the second place in the league, it is clear that the Champions League quarter-finals is more important to Ralph than the league.
If the time interval was longer, the main players could still fight on both fronts, but the two games were only three days apart, and the game against Lyon was away, so Ralph had to give up the league.
Hoffenheim, with most of the team consisting of substitutes, failed to beat their opponent and was tied 1-1 at home by Freiburg, who fought hard.
Lu Wenbin came on as a substitute in the 85th minute of the second half. He failed to score a goal or help Hoffenheim win, and naturally did not receive any experience reward.
Of course, no one cares about this.
Everyone knows that Hoffenheim's focus is on the Champions League quarter-final against Lyon three days later.
(asking for monthly ticket)