Hamburg - Bundesliga rookies 1899 Hoffenheim are the surprise leaders in the German Bundesliga after scoring twice in two minute to come from behind and beat Hanover 96 5-2 on Saturday.

Hoffenheim, who are in their first-ever season in Germany's top flight having gained promotion last season after spending only one season in the second division, took the lead in Hanover through Vedad Ibisevic after completely dominating the first half.

Hanover, however, came back strongly in the second half and went ahead through Christian Schulz and Jiri Stajner, but a goalkeeper mistake from Florian Fromlowitz, who was playing his first Bundesliga game for the injured Germany keeper Robert Enke gave Hoffenheim the chance to draw level.

Fromlowitz palmed a long range effort to the feet of Nigerian striker Chinedu Obasi, who made no mistake in the 70th minute. Two minutes later Sejad Salihovic put his side ahead.

Demba Ba and Ibisevic with his ninth goal of the season, which takes him to the top of the scorer charts, added to Hanover's misery, before Arnold Bruggink compounded the disaster for the home side with a red card shortly before the end of the game.

Bayer Leverkusen moved to third in the table with 15 points - one point behind Hoffenheim and SV Hamburg - after winning 2-0 at bottom- placed Eintracht Frankfurt.

Patrick Helmes opened the scoring with his eighth goal of the season in the sixth minute from the penalty spot. Arturo Vidal added a second on the hour.

In Bremen fans were treated to a pulsating 3-3 draw between Werder Bremen and Borussia Dortmund in which three goals were scored in the last two minutes.

Alexander Frei's opened the scoring for the visitors with a second half penalty after a foul by Frank Baumann.

Baumann then equalized for Bremen, but Mats Hummels put Dortmund back in the lead in the 72nd minute. Two minutes from the end Dortmund goalkeeper Roman Weidenfelder gifted Bremen an equalizer through Claudio Pizarro.

The Peruvian international thought he had given his side the victory in injury time with a brilliant individual goal, but former Bremen player Nelson Valdez managed an equalizer for the visitors after a mistake by Bremen keeper Tim Wiese.

Baumann said that it was a terrific match. "The last minutes were really crazy. We should not allow them to come back so late in the game, but it was a terrific match."

Bremen coach Thomas Schaaf said he was hoping for a victory before the game. "We should be upset about drawing a game in which you are winning 3-2 with less than a minute to go.

"The team was simply too passive in the end and we needed to have the strength to win."

Sebastian Kehl said that although he had been playing professional football for a long time, he had never played in a match like that. "In the end, all I could do was laugh. We thought we had it, then we lost it and then we came back."

VfL Wolfsburg managed to beat Arminia Bielefeld 4-1 through goals by Zvjezdan Misimovic, who scored twice, Alexander Madlung and Grafite. Alexander Laas pulled one back for Bielefeld.

Elsewhere Bayern Munich bounced back from their poor start to the season, winning 1-0 at SC Karlsruhe through a late Miroslav Klose goal, while Cologne beat a ten-man Energie Cottbus by the same score.

The final game of the round ended in a 2-1 victory for Hertha Berlin against VfB Stuttgart.

On Friday VfL Bochum drew 2-2 with Borussia Moenchengladbach.

Table toppers SV Hamburg can move back to the head of the standings on Sunday if they manage to beat Schalke 04 at home. A victory would take the team from northern Germany to 19 points and give them a three point advantage over Hoffenheim. (dpa)