Bundesliga: Leverkusen up to third after 4-0 thumping of Hannover

Bayer Leverkusen moved above Borussia Monchengladbach on goal difference and into third place in the Bundesliga thanks to a convincing 4-0 win over Hannover which heaps the pressure on the Lower Saxony club's coach Tayfun Korkut.

Omer Toprak gave the hosts the lead and Julian Brandt added a second before the interval.

Hannover had no answer to a strong Leverkusen side, who added two more goals through Kyriakos Papadopoulos and Stefan Kiessling to climb a place in the table, leaving Hannover just two points above the bottom three.

With Gladbach being held to a draw on Friday night, Leverkusen knew that a win by more than one goal would take them up to third and ahead of the Foals in the chase for a place in the Champions League group stage.

They were straight onto the front foot and several Hakan Calhanoglu set-pieces caused danger in the Hannover penalty area.

It was his corner which brought about the opening goal with Toprak rising to meet it at the far post, using his strength to beat his marker and head in.

Papadopoulos headed wide from another free-kick before the Turkish midfielder sent a direct effort over the crossbar.

Leverkusen still managed to add to their lead before the interval with Brandt taking down Kiessling's cross excellently before tucking the ball into the right-hand corner.

Kiessling was the provider of Leverkusen's third also, just after the break, when he went close to getting his name on the scoresheet.

The German forward's header struck the crossbar and Papadopoulos reacted quickly to turn the rebound in.

Kiessling finally got the goal his game deserved in the 70th minute when Lars Bender put him through, although replays showed he had drifted into an offside position and the goal should not have stood.

It had no influence on the final result, though, and Leverkusen could have further improved their goal difference late on when Karim Bellarabi's deflected shot only just missed the target.

Enough damage had been done, though, and Korkut's future as Hannover coach is hanging by a thread with his side failing once again to pick up their first win since mid-December, while Leverkusen made it a new club record seven wins in a row.