With the same team, which was unbeaten throughout the season, Xabi Alonso failed to bring Leverkusen to defend the Bundesliga trophy. The reason is very simple, because Bayern Munich managed to rise and rediscover their best performance. Everything will change at the BayArena, Ten Hag has a very different approach from Xabi Alonso. The departure of key players will certainly affect their chances in the competition, and it will take a lot of luck for Leverkusen to be able to win the trophy. However, Ten Hag deserves the chance to prove his managerial qualities.
When everything is fine at Bayern, they will dominate the Bundesliga, so I think it does not really matter who will coach Bayer, whether it is Alonso or Ten Hag, it will still be very difficult for them to compete with Bayern. In my opinion, Ten Hag is a good replacement for Alonso because he did a decent job at Ajax. And compared to how poorly Manchester United are playing with Amorim, you could say that Ten Hag achieved quite solid results with Manchester United. Honestly, I highly doubt that Bayer will be able to compete with Bayern because the team is going through major changes. But it will be interesting for me to see whether Bayer can hold on to second place behind Bayern after Alonso leaves.