Goals from Stefan Kießling, Kyriakos Papadopoulos, Julian Brandt and Omer Toprak secured a full deserved three points for Bayer Leverkusen, who are just a few points from making sure of a Champions League place next season.
Leverkusen survived a late scare against 1. FSV Mainz last weekend to secure yet another win and almost confirm a Champions League place for next season. Roger Schmidt's men were starting to show their early season form, though their was a surprise in his team selection when Karim Bellarabi was benched for the first time all season. Julian Brandt replaced him, while Kyriakos Papadopoulos came in for Tin Jedvaj in the only other change.
Tayfun Korkut's side picked up a hard-fought draw in the capital last weekend, though their coach wasn't entirely happy that they'd blown the lead with ten minutes to go. Leon Andreasen, Ceyhun Gülselam, Leandro Bittencourt and Joselu came in to freshen up their lacklustre attack, meaning Salif Sane, Jimmy Briand, Miiko Albornoz and Didier Ya Konan all dropped out.
Die Werkself had the best of the early exchanges. Hannover were a non-entity in attack and that gave the hosts a license to push up slightly further. Papadopoulos' header went inches wide of the goal after the quarter of the hour, when he really should have scored.
Schmidt's men didn't have to wait much longer, however, as a set-piece proved to be Hannover's weakness. Hakan Calhaoglu whipped in a great corner which was flicked in at the near post. What initially looked to have been a Marcelo own-goal turned out to be a fine header from Omer Toprak, a fine header and the lead Leverkusen deserved.
Hannover were dealt another blow soon after, as an injured Bittencourt couldn't continue and had to be replaced by Edgar Prib. It didn't get much better when Leverkusen added a second. This time Wendell and Stefan Kießling were the providers, working the ball into Brandt and he embarked on a teasing run before finishing low to Ron-Robert Zieler's left. The 18-year-old hadn't hit the heights of last season but that was a taster for what he was capable of.
Leverkusen were in a ruthless mood and scored their third soon after the restart. Kießling grabbed his second assist of the game, as his shot fell kindly to Papadopoulos and he didn't pass up the invitation of an open goal to put the result beyond doubt. The Leverkusen forward thought he'd scored a goal for himself, though his header was correctly ruled out for offside.
Any competitive nature fell out of the game after half-time and Kießling was able to capitalise on some lax defending to final score a goal of his own. Lars Bender collected a half-cleared corner, drove to the by-line and smashed the ball across goal. The forward who'd found his confidence again slid the ball into an empty net to put the icing on the cake in a fine individual and team performance.
Leverkusen held out very comfortably in the remaining minutes to secure a deserved three points, ahead of next week's Rhein Derby. Hannover, meanwhile, will be certainly looking over their shoulders as their poor run continues and they face Hoffenheim next weekend.