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The second matchday of the Bundesliga season began on Friday night with Stuttgart hammering Köln 4-1 at home.

Saturday afternoon then featured 10 teams in action.

Bayer Leverkusen welcomed Union Berlin, Borussia Mönchengladbach took on newly promoted Elversberg, Hoffenheim met Borussia Dortmund, Paderborn played Freiburg, and RB Leipzig travelled to Werder Bremen.

After their impressive 3-2 victory over Bayer Leverkusen last weekend, it seemed impossible that Elversberg could produce another shock and better what they had already done.

Well…

Away to Borussia Mönchengladbach, they were trailing 3-1 in the 60th minute and appeared to be heading for their first defeat of the season. But Maurice Krattenmacher gave Vincent Wagner’s team a route back into the game when he reduced the deficit to 3-2.

Felix Keidel then scored directly from a free-kick in the 80th minute to level matters. From that point, the momentum was completely with Elversberg, and they completed the comeback in the 92nd minute when Krattenmacher struck his second goal of the match to seal a 4-3 win.

The result leaves Elversberg joint top of the Bundesliga table, and given that this is the club’s first-ever season in the Bundesliga, it makes the achievement even more remarkable. They are also doing it without moving away from the approach that got them into this position in the first place.

It will also please head coach Wagner, who has said he will only visit their hairdresser if Elversberg lose a game. Now it remains to be seen whether they can go one better next week when they travel to Bayern Munich.

As for Gladbach, they may become the first side to dismiss their head coach if things continue in this direction.

For the second time this season, after the Super Cup, Borussia Dortmund made a match far more difficult for themselves before finally turning up. In the season opener, they fell 2-0 behind against Bayern before improving after the break and almost equalising at the very end.

Today against Hoffenheim, they again went 2-0 down, and it really gave the impression that this is not a transformed Dortmund side and that they are not much better than they were last season. However, unlike last season, when they probably would have drawn this game at best, this time it was different.

Serhou Guirassy and Fabio Silva scored twice in five minutes to bring Dortmund level. Then in the 86th minute, an Ethan Nwaneri cross was deflected in past Albian Hajdari to hand Niko Kovac’s side a 3-2 lead.

Is this a sustainable habit for Dortmund? No.

If you keep playing with fire, eventually you will get burnt, and that is exactly what Dortmund are risking when they switch off for spells and allow opponents to move in front.

Even though only two matchdays have been played, there are already signs that the Bundesliga may be more competitive this season. Werder Bremen’s 3-1 victory over RB Leipzig is perhaps the clearest example of that.

Daniel Thioune’s team produced a strong defensive performance to keep Leipzig at bay, while also being clinical enough in front of goal to score three times. The standout moment was Niclas Füllkrug netting his first Bundesliga goal since returning on loan earlier this summer.

There were other examples too: Elversberg’s results underline it, Union Berlin drew with Eintracht Frankfurt but lost to Bayer Leverkusen today, and Köln defeated Hoffenheim before being convincingly beaten by Stuttgart yesterday. At the time of writing, Schalke were also still level with Bayern Munich.

This is not to suggest that the Bundesliga title race will necessarily become a thriller, but it does point to the league’s overall floor having risen over the summer, whether through the quality of players brought in by the lower-ranked sides or the kind of football they are now playing.