A goal and two assists from Nigeria international, Victor Boniface helped Bayer Leverkusen to a 3-0 home win over Eintracht Frankfurt, sending the league leaders seven points clear.
Bayern Munich and Stuttgart, who are seven and eight points behind respectively, can narrow the gap to Leverkusen when they clash in the Bavarian capital later on Sunday.
Xabi Alonso’s unbeaten Leverkusen, who have won 21 and drawn three of 24 matches in all competitions this season, overran the visitors thanks to a brilliant Boniface performance.
Before the match, the Leverkusen fans unveiled a huge Christmas wishlist, calling on the club to make their Bundesliga title dreams come true.
“We’ve won nothing yet. After half a year nobody wins anything, especially not a league title,” Leverkusen midfielder Granit Xhaka said to DAZN.
“We’ve got another game midweek and then we go on holiday, where we need to be careful what we do. Then we’ll come back and step on the gas ahead of the rest of the season,” he said.
Boniface squeezed a low shot under Kevin Trapp to open the scoring 14 minutes in.
The Nigerian then created a goal for Jeremie Frimpong early in the second half, his shot rebounding off Trapp and landing perfectly for the Dutch international to slam home.
The 22-year-old, who is almost certain to be selected for Nigeria’s Africa Cup of Nations bid in January, then helped seal the result, finding Florian Wirtz in space for Leverkusen’s third.
Wirtz, who was again superb while pulling the strings in midfield, hit the crossbar with 10 remaining.
Frankfurt have won just one of their past eight matches in all competitions — last Saturday’s surprising 5-1 home thrashing of Bayern.
Bayern, who have played two games fewer than Leverkusen, will host Stuttgart without midfielders Joshua Kimmich and Leon Goretzka, along with backup goalkeeper Sven Ulreich, all ruled out with the flu.
With Noussair Mazraoui and Kingsley Coman joining Serge Gnabry on the injury list this week, Bayern have just five outfield players on the bench.
Credit: punchng.com
