Sidney Sam's second-half goal was enough to secure Bayer Leverkusen a 1-0 away victory over Schalke whose nightmare season continues.

Sam scored the only goal of the game in the 65th minute while Schalke hit the goal framework three times - twice through Klaas-Jan Huntelaar. Leverkusen remain undefeated away from home, while Schalke have yet to win a home game and have collected just one victory in their last six matches.

Cologne climbed off the foot of the table as a hat-trick from Milivoje Novakovic earned a 3-2 home win over Hamburg. Novakovic had been banished to the bench by former boss Zvonimir Soldo, but came up with a treble in his first Bundesliga game under interim coach Frank Schaefer. After Novakovic gave Cologne the lead in the 11th minute, Mladen Petric and Heung Min Son replied to give Hamburg a 2-1 lead. But Novakovic equalised after 29 minutes and then gave Cologne the win in the 84th minute.

Wolfsburg picked up a welcome 2-0 victory at home to Stuttgart, ending a three-game winless streak. Simon Kjaer opened the scoring for Steve McClaren's side in the sixth minute and Edin Dzeko made sure of the three points with 14 minutes to play.

Kaiserslautern halted a five-game losing streak in convincing fashion with a 3-0 home win over Borussia Monchengladbach. The home side scored three times in the last 19 minutes with Christian Tiffert opening the scoring and Adam Nemec making it 2-0. Srdjan Lakic finished off the visitors in the 88th minute.

Ilkay Gundogan scored twice as Nurnberg continued their strong season with a 3-2 victory at Werder Bremen. Hugo Almeida gave Bremen the lead after five minutes but Gundogan equalised on the stroke of half-time.

Mehmet Ekici made it 2-1 for Nurnberg after 47 minutes and the visitors went 3-1 up after 73 minutes with Gundogan's second goal. Claudio Pizarro grabbed a consolation goal for Bremen two minutes into stoppage time.

Theofanis Gekas continued his fine goalscoring form with a double as Eintracht Frankfurt recorded an impressive 3-1 away win over St Pauli. The former Greece international has nine goals in Frankfurt's recent campaign.