Lucien Favre had said his side had nothing to lose, but lose they did – their six successive Bundesliga defeat at the Allianz ArenaEvery team has their blind spot, their house of horror, where they can’t put a foot right. On the weekend of Der Klassiker we were emphatically reminded that Borussia Dortmund’s bad place is against ostensibly their biggest domestic rivals.“In Munich,” wrote the ESPN journalist Stephan Uersfeld, “Dortmund are the new Hamburg.” Related: Bayern Munich crush Dortmund thanks to Robert Lewandowski double Related: Frankfurt’s captain sent off for knocking over Freiburg coach, sparking chaos Continue reading...
Manchester City manager could have won even more if he had incorporated a greater range of personalities in his teamsOne of the many tragedies of humanity is that the things we like in others – and in ourselves – are strongly related to the things we don’t like. So when we praise Pep Guardiola’s vision, precision and idealism, responsible for some of the most beautiful football ever seen, we must also evaluate his zealotry, obsession and narcissism, responsible for some of the most avoidable failures ever seen. Or, put another way, he probably is bald, definitely isn’t a fraud and absolutely that jardigan is a hate crime. Related: ‘The Romário-fication of Raheem’: how Manchester City transformed Sterling Related: Manchester City...
Hoffenheim ending a major run of invincibility underlined how the perception of Bayern has changed under Niko KovacThis Sunday was the Bayern Munich squad’s traditional drop-in to Oktoberfest. It’s an iconic scene with the players and their families, who dress up in traditional Bavarian outfits of lederhosen and toast the moment. The atmosphere is often heady. On one occasion, the story goes, Pep Guardiola spontaneously decided that he and his charges should commandeer a private jet to fly off and watch Juventus take on Roma in a Serie A top-of-the-table clash in Turin.This time, the mood was slightly different. Manuel Neuer “could be happy”, wrote Süddeutsche Zeitung’s Lisa Sonnabend. “He can have a drink on Sunday at the Oktoberfest, because...
Bundesliga title pretenders were battered by the champions but stole a draw and know now how much they must improveIt had promised so much, and yet had been such hard going. “It was,” said Leipzig’s coach, Julian Nagelsmann, “like a run in the forest without much football” for his team. For all the pre-match excitement that they might be facing Bayern Munich at the right time, catching them before they were settled into their season stride, much of this felt ominously familiar for those hoping for a meaningful Bundesliga title race again. The leaders versus the champions looked, for a large chunk of early Saturday evening, like the also-rans against the lords of the manor.This was no evening for anybody...
Barcelona, PSG, Bayern and Juventus have won 25 of the last 28 league titles. Europe has become the only testing groundD id you feel it? The great disturbance in the force, as though millions of voices cried out in hope? Last weekend, something remarkable happened: none of the champions of Europe’s big five leagues won (a statistic that admittedly loses some of its potency when it is acknowledged that Serie A hadn’t started: Juventus kicked off their Serie A campaign on Saturday with a 1-0 win at Parma).Last season was the first time that each of the big five leagues had been retained, but here was the little man striking back: Barcelona lost, Paris Saint-Germain lost, Manchester City drew, Bayern...