The celebrations were not what they might have been. Bayern Munich had planned a Christmas display after the Friday night game with RB Leipzig, the full stop to their calendar year, which was swiftly cancelled after news filtered through of the awful attacks in Magdeburg, as the club’s CEO, Jan-Christian Dreesen, explained on the pitch at full time. While the mood was understandably dampened, Bayern had said what they wanted to on the field, just as Bayer Leverkusen did later on Saturday. In case you were in any doubt, there are just two to watch in the title race in the second half of the Bundesliga campaign. The team of 2024, and the team that is determined to make 2025 theirs.

A 5-1 statement by the leaders answered in kind less than 24 hours later by the champions. Leverkusen needed their equally resounding win over Freiburg to keep pace with Bayern after their demolition of RB Leipzig. They also needed it to cut away the rest of the pack, to clarify the title race to come. Never mind the four points by which Leverkusen trail Bayern. It is the five that separate the second-placed Werkself from Eintracht Frankfurt in third, after the latter’s surprise home defeat to Mainz (last week’s conquerors of Bayern), which mean that the table has been adjusted to more reflect reality going into the Winterpause.

Even Red Bull’s chief, Oliver Mintzlaff, while admitting his club – and coach, Marco Rose – were subject to “the football laws” of pressure of results in a Sunday interview with Bild Sport, seemed to edge more towards an acceptance of where the current power lies than in the direction of the ruthlessness Leipzig are often known for. “We have no question marks over Marco,” he insisted, “not even for the second half of the season.” The club are clearly disappointed in their six defeats out of six in the Champions League, but there is understanding of the current injury situation, and recognition of recent improvement after a really rocky spell that had seemed to push Rose to the brink.

That improvement, however, was never likely to continue at the Allianz Arena. A Bayern side simultaneously piqued by last week’s first Bundesliga loss of the season, at Mainz, and stimulated by a midweek without a fixture were too hot to handle. Leipzig had offered themselves early hope despite conceding inside 30 seconds; Benjamin Sesko equalising before there were two minutes on the clock. Yet just as Jamal Musiala’s opener had been caused by a combination of Leipzig’s rushed play out from the back and Bayern’s zesty press, the rest of the match continued in this manner and it felt as if the final score was light on the visitors. Quality opposition has often brought the best out of Bayern in previous seasons, but Leipzig had little chance to even mimic resistance here. For Vincent Kompany, after an overwhelmingly positive first season so far, a first win against top opposition (perhaps the one criticism of his reign so far) was the pre-Christmas tonic needed.

Before Leverkusen were warmly greeted by their fans in the BayArena cold a day later, thanked for the year of the gathered’s football-supporting lives, they showed exactly how they had done it. Florian Wirtz’s penalty miss in a goalless first half proved anecdotal. The maestro ended with one goal and three assists with the main beneficiary being Patrik Schick. Four goals for the Czech took him to nine in his last five Bundesliga games.

Schick was surprisingly hard on himself – “my game was OK today, but not top,” he said, not a point of view that Xabi Alonso nor sporting director, Simon Rolfes, subscribed to – while platforming Wirtz’s majesty. “He is an incredible player,” enthused Schick. While their star must be protected and preserved at all costs, as Alonso has self-consciously done already this season, Schick is perhaps more an indication of Leverkusen’s durability. Hammered by injuries, they have never complained about the setbacks but simply ran with it as best they can. This, and their ability to sail on in gusty winds, suggests they have the stomach for another title fight, to test this renewed Bayern as thoroughly as possible.

Even while enjoying a brief hiatus, eyes must dart forward to when these two meet in Leverkusen in less than two months, on 15 February, maybe the TopSpiel to end them all. Already, we are counting away the days.

Talking points

• Borussia Dortmund’s farewell to 2024 underlined that for all the changes of this calendar year, no team tiptoes the line between glory and total failure quite like them. Sunday’s 3-1 win at Wolfsburg puts them back in the top six, two points off the top four, whereas they had they lost, they would have finished the year outside the top 10 for the first time since Jürgen Klopp’s difficult final season a decade ago. This was no given; BVB hadn’t won away in the Bundesliga since April and after racing into a three-goal lead (which could easily have been more) in a whirlwind first half, Nuri Sahin’s side made it tough for themselves after the break, conceding a goal to Denis Vavro and going a man down (after Pascal Gross made a last-man foul) in the space of four second-half minutes. It was BVB’s inconsistencies in microcosm. “We played really well in the first half,” Sahin told DAZN. “In the second half, we brought the opponent back into the game completely unnecessarily.”

• That Sahin’s men are sixth is an indication of how densely packed the traffic is in the top half of the table. Despite falling to a surprise 1-0 home defeat by St Pauli, 10th-placed Stuttgart are only two points behind Mainz in fifth and four adrift of Eintracht Frankfurt in third.

• Yes, Eintracht remain on the podium despite losing to a Mainz side that played with 10 men from 20 minutes in after their captain Nadiem Amiri was sent off for a studs-up challenge. Bo Henriksen’s side again looked extremely tight and effective while the home team’s numbers of 70% possession and 34 efforts at goal make it sound as if they were much more threatening than they actually were. It feels like Dino Toppmöller and company, so excellent in the first half of the season, need a break. The loss of the ill Kevin Trapp in goal made the difference, with his deputy Kauã Santos dropping a huge clanger to gift Mainz the opener and rarely looking more convincing afterwards.

• Some Christmas cheer for Bochum, who gained their first Bundesliga win of the season at the 16th attempt by deservedly beating fast-falling Heidenheim 2-0. After a strong first half garlanded by Matus Bero’s brilliant goal, Patrick Drewes kept a first clean sheet of the season eight days after he was hit by a lighter at Union Berlin. He had spent the time since “reading as little as possible” after scores of people in the media – including former Union striker Max Kruse – and on social networks accused him of exaggerating the damage. Should the DFB hearing on 9 January award Bochum a win from that game in Berlin, the great escape really could be on.