There had been speculation in Germany that the young Australian would start against Wolfsburg after an impressive league debut as a sub in last weekend's 1-1 draw with Stuttgart and following an injury to striker Igor de Camargo.

However Gladbach boss Lucien Favre opted to start Raul Bobadilla alongside Mike Hanke up front and the decision appeared to pay off with the goals flowing.

Wolfsburg had gone ahead on 12 minutes through Japanese midfielder Makoto Hasebe, but Bobadilla set up Marco Reus for a leveller after quarter of an hour.

Filip Daems netted a penalty on 32 minutes to put Gladbach ahead, before Bobadilla made it three before the break.

Reus made it 4-1 after 67 minutes, with Leckie coming off the bench on 81 minutes, although he didn't have enough to time to get in on the scoring.

Meanwhile in Germany's 2.Bundesliga on Friday, Robbie Kruse was an 81st-minute substitute in Fortuna Dusseldorf's 3-1 victory over 1860 Munich.