VfB Stuttgart vs Borussia Mönchengladbach

Three of the last four in this fixture have gone to Stuttgart, and the two most recent were the most convincing of the set. They won 3-1 at Mönchengladbach on 14 September 2024, lost 2-1 at home on 1 February 2025, won 1-0 at home on 30 August 2025 and then won 3-0 away on 25 January 2026. Last season's pair therefore went to Stuttgart by a combined 4-0, with no goal conceded in either.

The outlier matters, though. That 2-1 in February 2025 was Mönchengladbach winning at this ground, a goal up at the interval and still ahead at the end, and it is the one piece of evidence on the page that the visitors can take something here. It is nearly two years old and the squads have turned over twice since, so we treat it as a reminder, not a trend.

Taken together, the record says Stuttgart usually handle this fixture, and cleanly. What it says about the version of Stuttgart that has turned up this season is nothing at all.

The 2025/26 table had these clubs eight places and twenty-four points apart. Stuttgart finished fourth on 62 points from eighteen wins, eight draws and eight defeats, 71 scored and 49 conceded for +22. Mönchengladbach were twelfth on 38, from nine wins, eleven draws and fourteen defeats, 42 scored and 53 conceded for −11. Neither club's current position resembles that.

Six matches each this season — a real sample now, if still a short one. Stuttgart are thirteenth on six points from two wins and four defeats, eight scored and ten conceded. They were beaten 5-1 at Bayern on 28 August, beat Köln 4-1 at home on 4 September, lost 2-1 at Hoffenheim on 12 September, lost 1-0 at home to Dortmund on 19 September, won 2-0 at Paderborn on 10 October and lost 1-0 at Hamburg on 17 October. Note the venue split in that list: only two of the six were at home.

Mönchengladbach are eighteenth on no points at all, the only club in the division yet to take one. Six matches, six defeats, eight scored and twenty conceded. They lost 3-0 at Leipzig on 29 August, 4-3 at home to Elversberg on 5 September, 5-0 at Freiburg on 12 September, 4-3 at home to Mainz on 19 September, 2-1 at Köln on 11 October and 2-1 at home to Hoffenheim on 18 October. Four of the six were by a single goal; two were hammerings.

The first factor is the away record, and it is the worst number either club brings to this match. Mönchengladbach have played three on the road and scored one goal in them, conceding ten: 0-3, 0-5 and 1-2. Whatever competitiveness they have shown has come at home, where all three of their defeats were by a single goal and where they scored seven.

Second, the defensive totals. Twenty conceded in six is a rate no club survives at, and they have conceded at least two in every match. Stuttgart's attack has not been good — eight goals in six, shut out twice — but their one comfortable afternoon this season was the 4-1 against Köln at this ground, and a defence shipping more than three a game is the sort they have already punished.

Third, Stuttgart's own decline is real and cuts against us. Fourth last season, thirteenth now, four defeats in six, and beaten at home by Dortmund. They have also played four of their six away from home, so their six points have come from a thinner set of home chances than most; Mönchengladbach split theirs evenly and took nothing from either half.

Fourth, what the fixture means on a Friday night in late October. A club without a point after six is already at the stage where its season turns on games like this, and Mönchengladbach's away form suggests no way of containing one. Stuttgart, meanwhile, cannot afford another home defeat if they want to be near the European places by the winter.

Fifth, the thing we cannot measure. Squad churn over the summer sits between last season's 71 goals and this season's eight, and between a 38-point club and a pointless one. The table in front of us is six matches old, and the one it replaced belongs to a season that is over.

We take a VfB Stuttgart win at 1.62 with medium confidence. The case rests on the visitors rather than the hosts: Borussia Mönchengladbach have lost all six, conceded twenty, conceded at least twice in every match and scored once in three away trips. Stuttgart have won this fixture three times in four, and both of last season's meetings without conceding. A side that cannot keep a clean sheet against anyone is the ideal opponent for an attack that has managed eight goals in six matches.

Confidence is medium rather than high because Stuttgart are poor at the moment: two wins in six, a 1-0 defeat at Hamburg last time out, and only two home games played, one won and one lost. Our settled record is no help either way here: 1X2 has returned −1.0% across 195 picks and the 1.60–1.80 band −2.1%, both close enough to level that they argue neither for nor against. We have taken the straight win rather than a shorter double chance or a handicap the attacking numbers do not support.

The thing that beats this is Mönchengladbach's home form, oddly enough — the same three matches that produced three defeats also produced seven goals, and all three were lost by a single goal, so this is not a side that has stopped scoring. If they get the first goal, Stuttgart's season says the response is not guaranteed: they have been held to one goal or none in four of their six. A 1-1, or a repeat of February 2025, is the realistic route to losing this bet.