German Bundesliga Review

Bayern Munich returned to the top of the Bundesliga with their fifth straight win after seeing off Schalke 2-0.

Nils Petersen and Thomas Muller scored the goals for a Bayern side who did not even need to move out of first gear to beat the Royal Blues, who succumbed to their second straight defeat.

Bayern goalkeeper Manuel Neuer, making his first return to the Arena AufSchalke since his summer transfer between the two clubs, was nothing more than a spectator for 90 minutes, as he had been as a young boy on the terraces of Gelsenkirchen's Park Stadion.

In Sunday's other game, Hannover struck twice in the last five minutes to win 2-1 and condemn Bundesliga champions Borussia Dortmund to a third defeat of the season.

Dortmund looked set for their first away win of the campaign on the back of Shinji Kagawa's well-taken 63rd-minute strike.

But with four minutes to go Karim Haggui struck an equalizer and Didier Konan then kept his cool to win it in the dying seconds.

The result means Dortmund have lost three of their opening six games after waltzing to the title last season.

On Saturday, Lukas Podolski inspired Cologne to a 4-1 win over Bayer Leverkusen in Stale Solbakken and Robin Dutt's first Rhineland derby in charge of the respective local rivals.

Podolski created Cologne's first goal for Milivoje Novakovic just before half time before scoring the second just after the interval.

Podolski's second and Cologne's third sealed the win in the 54th minute before Simon Rolfes grabbed a consolation for the home side.

Andre Schurrle was sent off late on before Mato Jajalo completed the scoring with Cologne's fourth deep in stoppage time.

Borussia Monchengladbach climbed to second in the standings for 24 hours with a narrow 1-0 victory at rock-bottom Hamburg.

Igor de Camargo headed home the game's only goal in the 66th minute to send Lucien Favre's side level on 13 points with Werder Bremen.

Nurnberg fought back to secure a hard-fought 1-1 draw in horrendous conditions against 10-man Bremen.

Heavy rain made playing conditions almost impossible and the visitors were hardly helped by the early dismissal of goalkeeper Tim Wiese.

Mehmet Ekici put Werder ahead against the run of play but Philipp Wollscheid earned his side a deserved point with his second-half goal.

Hoffenheim kept up the pressure on the leaders as two goals from Roberto Firmino guided them to a 3-1 victory over Wolfsburg.

Former Liverpool forward Ryan Babel opened the scoring after 20 minutes before Brazilian Firmino doubled the lead three minutes later.

Ashkan Dejagah pulled one back before Firmino struck again four minutes from time, after Wolfsburg goalkeeper Marvin Hitz was sent off for abusive language.

Kaiserslautern came from behind to win their first Bundesliga match of the season, beating local rivals Mainz 3-1 at the Betzenberg.

Eric-Maxim Choupo-Moting gave the visitors the lead after a quarter of an hour, but an own goal from Bo Svensson brought the home side level within 10 minutes.

Itay Schechter put the Red Devils in front in the 54th minute before Christian Tiffert sealed the win in the 73rd minute.

Augsburg survived the late dismissal of Sebastien Langkamp to hold on for an decent 2-2 draw on the road at Hertha Berlin.

Hajime Hosogai fired the visitors into the lead in the first half but goals from Christian Lell and Tunay Torun early in the second period put Hertha in the driving seat.

Jan-Ingwer Callsen-Bracker's strike on 64 minutes secured a point for the promoted side, although they endured a nervy final few minutes after Langkamp saw red for a professional foul on Raffael.

On Friday night, Martin Harnik scored twice as Stuttgart gained a 2-1 victory at Freiburg.

The Austria forward netted in each half to put the visitors firmly in control, Papiss Cisse's 85th-minute effort coming too late for the hosts.