Podolski Plays Back the Faithful

By GABRIELE MARCOTTI

Strikers have the same relationship with goals that baseball players do with hits. If you're stuck in a diabolically long "oh-fer," it doesn't really matter whether it's a lucky, deflected goal or a fortunate bloop single that turns into a hit thanks to a magnanimous official scorer.

Thus, when Lukas Podolski's indirect free kick against Bayern Munich found the back of the net during Saturday's match (with a bit of help from Bayern goalkeeper Hans-Jorg Butt), the Cologne striker wheeled away and celebrated as if he'd nailed the winner in the World Cup final.

It was Mr. Podolski's first goal for Cologne in 1,610 minutes on the pitch in the Bundesliga and German Cup competition (he scored his only other goal way back on Sept. 13).

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Cologne's Lukas Podolski, left, scores the opening goal in the Bundesliga match against Bayern Munich on Sunday. It was his first successful strike in 18 matches.

Top strikers tend to score every other game, that is a goal approximately every 180 minutes. As long as they contribute in other ways, you can accept a rate of one in four or even one in five, which would work out to one every 450 minutes. But two goals in 20 matches is an aberration, particularly for a player who's a regular for the national team (in fact, at just 24 years of age, he's already among the top 25 in career appearances for Germany) and who cost Cologne a club-record $13.6 million when he arrived from Bayern last summer.

"I knew it was just a matter of time," he said after the game. Such was his ear-to-ear grin, that even opponents were happy for Mr. Podolski. "I know I'm not supposed to say this, but I think it's awesome that he scored against us," Bayern midfielder Bastian Schweinsteiger said.

The fact that he broke his drought against Bayern—his previous club and the league leader—took on a metaphorical significance. Mr. Podolski was something of a prodigy when he made his debut for Cologne back in 2003, and, after three outstanding seasons, Bayern snapped him up with much fanfare.

For Cologne fans, seeing their hometown hero move to Germany's biggest club was akin to proud parents watching their kid go off to college: It's painful but somewhat inevitable. After all, wealthy Bayern regularly vacuums up most of the top young talent in Germany and, in some ways, it was a mark of pride that Cologne had produced such a budding star.

Except Mr. Podolski struggled to go to the next level. He started just 33 games out of a possible 102 during the next three years, and it appeared that his confidence was ebbing away, even as he remained a stalwart for the national team. By this past January, it was obvious he needed a change of scenery and, from Bayern's perspective, it made sense to let him go.

Cologne announced it was eager to have him back and would go to great lengths to make it happen. How far did the club go? As far as emulating the "Million Dollar Web Page" in an attempt to raise the required funds, that's how far.

After being quoted a €10 million ($13.6 million) price by Bayern—more than it said it could afford—Cologne launched a Web site featuring Mr. Podolski's face digitized into 40,000 pixels. Fans could purchase pixels for €25 each and, eventually, all 40,000 were sold, raising an additional €1 million, which funded Mr. Podolski's move. To help things along, Mr. Podolski also agreed to take a pay cut.

While professionally it may have been a step back—Bayern is Germany's most successful club, while Cologne hasn't won a league title since 1978—many saw it as a chance for Mr. Podolski to jump-start his career. After all, Mr. Podolski had grown up at Cologne, joining the youth academy in 1995. Maybe all he needed was to get out the big pond and into a smaller, more comfortable one.

Things haven't quite worked out as well as the club—and supporters who sponsored the pixels—might have hoped.

Whether or not he has finally turned the corner remains to be seen, but the relief felt in Cologne now that the nearly six-month-long streak of goose eggs is no more was enough to send fans into a frenzy, and overshadow the fact that Mr. Schweinsteiger later equalized for Bayern, fixing the final score at 1-1.

If it means that, after nearly four years of not living up to his talent, Mr. Podolski has regained his mojo, it could be the most important goal of his career.