German Cup Round of 16

Across Germany, the Champions League takes a passenger seat this week as the country's premier knockout competition, the German Cup (or DFB Pokal in German), makes its return. As you'd expect, the teams involved in the Round of 16 matches include underdogs, favorites and everything in between.

The powder keg will be charged when Borussia Dortmund head to face Dynamo Dresden in what is expected to be a 30,000 sell-out. The eastern German club won eight championships in the former East Germany. Back then, European club competitions were a stable diet for the club's supporters who have more recently gained headlines for their violent behavior.

This season, the team from eastern Germany have been a welcome addition to the German Cup tournament, bringing raucous home support to the competition, which has seen them topple the likes of Schalke and Bochum so far.

Normally, Dynamo Dresden play in the German third division, with their financial problems replicated across most of the former East German heavyweights. A win against Dortmund would be a nice paycheck for the club, but the match doesn't quite come at the right time. Even after Dynamo's win on Saturday, Jürgen Klopp's team have just come off a confidence-boosting local derby thumping of Schalke.

With Juventus around the corner for Jürgen Klopp's men, Dortmund will be focused on not taking the foot of the gas in their trip to Stadion Dresden.

Leverkusen to build on CL success?

Another team with hopes of winning the German Cup are Bayer Leverkusen who on Tuesday host Kaiserslautern, a team currently in contention for promotion back to the country's top flight.

Leverkusen recovered from a four-game winless run to dispatch Atletico Madrid last Wednesday, setting up a mouth-watering second leg in Spain three weeks from now. Roger Schmidt's team are aiming to schedule two visits to Berlin within a week in May and June, but have only won the competition once (back in 1993) and boast an ordinary Cup record in recent seasons.

Elsewhere on Tuesday, VfR Aalen of Germany's second tier take on Hoffenheim who have yet to win the competition, while SC Freiburg host four-time winners Cologne in the only all-Bundesliga tie of the round.

Can the Kickers kick out Gladbach?

Wednesday's fixtures sees the lowest-ranked team in the competition, Kickers Offenbach, welcome Bundesliga stalwarts Borussia Mönchengladbach.

Offenbach, hailing just 20 kilometers (12.43 miles) from Frankfurt, are something of a cult-team in Germany, having written their name in football folklore with a German Cup win in 1970. When the German national championship was settled by a set of play-offs before the foundation of the Bundesliga in 1963, Offenbach went all the way to the final, losing in 1950 to Stuttgart and in 1959 to Frankfurt.

But now, Offenbach are leading the south-West section of the four tier with hopes of returning to the third division next season. The lower league team meet a Gladbach side, which has been out-of-sync for several months as shown by their European exit to Sevilla in midweek.

Meanwhile, holders Bayern Munich have the routine task of beating second division club Eintracht Braunschweig, while Werder Bremen's job at Arminia Bielefeld could be the potential giant-killing of the round.

Bremen's opponents from last Sunday, Wolfsburg, will head to Leipzig to take on the the Red Bull-backed club, RB Leipzig. The team, which is now 11 points off the pace in the second division, looked like they might grab promotion to the German top flight in the early stages of this season.