On a brisk, fresh Sunday afternoon in Leverkusen, Bayer and Borussia Monchengladbach played out an entertaining 1-1 draw in front of a capacity crowd. Raul Brouwers' first goal of the season canceled out Hakan Calhanoglu's wonderful first half strike, as the sides sitting in third and fourth place respectively looked to stretch into a more comfortable position in the table before the Hinrunde.

Both sides came into the game off the back of securing European progression midweek, with Leverkusen finishing second in their Champions League group, and Gladbach finishing top of their Europa League group. With 23 points each, as well as a +7 goal difference, their situations were extremely similar pre-game, so a tight encounter was expected. To add to the clash, Gladbach's on-loan central midfielder was set to feature against his parent club.

After a cautious opening 15 minutes, littered with fouls and mistakes, Leverkusen began to pepper Yann Sommer's goal with several long-range efforts. Hakan Calhanoglu opened the scoring for the hosts in the 18th minute with a wonderful, dipping attempt. The Turkish midfielder picked up the ball around 25 yards out, drifted right and whipped a powerful shot over the helpless Sommer and into the top left corner.

https://v.cdn.vine.co/r/videos/943AC9B0C61155926386796544000_305f67e42d1.1.1.9885499008211482045.mp4?versionId=hxIdan6G_nQLL_vdCORJZHFLaTKWvvkL

However, despite dominating for vast periods of the first half, old problems surfaced, as some poor set piece marking led to Raul Brouwers smashing home a 40th minte leveler, his first goal for the Foals since 2012. That left the sides level at the break, and an enthralling second period promised.

Brouwers celebrates his equaliser

A multitude of second half chances, falling namely to Brouwers from yet another dangerous Thorgan Hazard delivery, arrived, but weren't capitalised upon. Leverkusen's high pressing vs. Gladbach's rapid counter attack was always going to result in some quick breakaways, but ultimately neither side could convert promising breaks into clear cut chances. At full time, the sides had remained level, and gifted Wolfsburg to build an 8 point lead should they win later this evening.

A point is a decent result for each side, however, with Leverkusen traveling to Hoffenheim and Gladbach hosting Werder Bremen in mid week.