Breaking News: Van Buyten Injured as Amateurs Draw vs. Wacker Burghausen
By: Luke |
2 Comments
FC Bayern Munich’s central defender Daniel van Buyten left the pitch limping slowly 18 minutes into today’s 3. Liga match between FC Bayern II and Wacker Burghausen. Initial reports indicate that Van Buyten suffered an injured left ankle and will undergo x-rays at a Munich hospital. Update The club’s website now reports the initial diagnosis as “suspected torn ligaments” in the ankle. Van Buyten had remained in Munich and was playing with the amateurs while awaiting the birth of his first child. The match ended in a 1-1 draw.
Kraft-less in Gelsenkirchen: Number 2 Keeper Suffers Possible Concussion
By: Luke | 6 Comments
The hits just keep on coming, but not many were as hard as the one Thomas Kraft took in training, one that will keep him out this weekend’s LIGA total! Cup.
For Kraft, bleeding Bayern red is no metaphor
Bayern have now confirmed that Hamit Altintop (thigh) will not be available. Daniel van Buyten will also stay in Munich, awaiting the birth of his child–but will play in the amateur match against Wacker Burghausen on Saturday (and hopefully not get the fateful call from the hospital 20 minutes into the match). Maximilian Haas has traveled with the first team and will likely start at CB on Saturday.
Kraft’s injury will provide a tremendous opportunity for new signing and projected amateur #1 Rouven Sattelmaier. The 22 year old Sattelmaier, considered one of the 3. Liga’s elite players with Jahn Regensburg, signed a two year deal to join Bayern this summer. He also has one of the better personal websites among the players. If you’ve missed seeing him in training this summer, the video below will give you some idea of his exploits over the past seasons..
If however, you are looking for some good injury news, a picture is worth a thousand words..
Category: 1. Bundesliga, 3. Bundesliga, FC Bayern Munich, FC Bayern Munich II, Injuries, Matches, Photos, Players, Team News, VideosLIGA total! Cup Semi-Final Preview: FC Bayern Munich vs. 1. FC Köln
By: Luke | 4 Comments
Saturday marks the first encounter with Bundesliga competition in the new season as FC Bayern Munich take on 1. FC Köln at Veltins Arena in Gelsenkirchen in the semi-final of the LIGA total! Cup. The match will kick off at 12:35 p.m. Eastern in the US, but there will be no broadcast or satellite coverage of the match in North America. The matches will show live on Sat.1 in Germany, so you’re likely to have a stream option if you go to the pages of some of the usual suspects.
Tournament Summary
Participants: FC Bayern Munich, 1. FC Köln, Hamburger SV, Schalke 04
Format: Matches will be 60 minutes long, with 30 minute halves. A tie match will go directly to penalties.
Schedule: Semi-finals to be played Saturday, 3rd place match and Championship match on Sunday. 10:45 a.m./12:35 p.m. Eastern both days.
Bayern Offside will be unable to provide live coverage for the Saturday match. However, win or lose on Saturday, there will be a live blog up for the Sunday match. Hopefully, we’ll be adding another trophy to the case. Last season, when the competition was called the T-Home Cup, Bayern slipped up in the opening match, dropping a 1-0 decision to eventual tournament champ Hamburger SV. Bayern was able to knock off Schalke in the consolation match for 3rd place.
Kölner False Starts
It’s not been the prettiest of beginnings for Köln, who in my view, will have a fight on their hands to stay in the league this season. They lost a friendly against Anderlecht, then a friendly at their Austrian training camp against the Saudi champs turned ugly and fan stupidity followed. In their most recent test, they fell again, to RC Lens 2-1, with another fracas resulting in a red card for Canadian Kevin McKenna.
Köln have just added Brazilian right back Andrézinho, who will now be the presumed starter at that position, though I don’t think we’ll see him this weekend. With regular forward pairing Podolski and Novakovich still wrapping up their World Cup breaks, one player to watch for is Alexandru Ionita. The former Dynamo Bucharest player had 10 goals in the Romanian league a season ago, and represents Köln’s biggest buy of the summer.
Roster Still Thin for Reds
Louis van Gaal probably won’t have to insert a fitness trainer into the match, but he’s still going to have a selection headache for this tournament. Once again, he’ll be forced to use a few amateur players, despite the fact that the amateurs will also have a match on Saturday. A pro roster for the weekend was not available as of post time, but Francy Ribery will definitely not take part. Bayern will apparently be without Hamit Altintop, who did not train with the main group on Wednesday, and Daniel van Buyten (girlfriend about to give birth). We should see David Alaba rejoin the pros on Sunday following the amateur match on Saturday. Despite only a few days of training, I expect Demichelis to see at least some action on Saturday or Sunday, as Bayern literally don’t have any other CB’s around if Van Buyten is missing. It’s hard to appraise the state of the team after the first friendly, but there don’t seem to be any major defects. Thomas Kraft had an excellent sequence in goal last weekend when his defenders let him down, and seems ready for the challenge ahead.
Prediction: FC Bayern Munich 2:0 1. FC Köln
Category: 1. Bundesliga, 3. Bundesliga, FC Bayern Munich, Injuries, Matches, Players, Previews, Team NewsTraining Video: Drills, Drills, Drills
By: Luke | 4 Comments
Wednesday’s training isn’t going to win any awards for sheer excitement, but it is nice to see the pro squad growing slightly with the inclusion of Demichelis and the return of Alaba and Van Buyten (who is still on the baby watch). Ribery remains on a rehab program separate from the main group, and it appears Altintop must also still be rehabbing from the muscle problem that cut his Italian training camp short.
Among the highlights in today’s videos are Ivica Olic looking like he can still outrun anybody and something I would call the “old man shuffle”.
Part I
Part II
Tuesday Night’s One-Liners
By: Luke | 45 Comments
It’s been a pretty slow couple of days. Here are a few bits to tide you over until we get an actual transfer or an actual match played.
*Comments from management over the last few days have made it clear that Holger Badstuber will have a spot in the starting 11 while Martin Demichelis and Daniel van Buyten will compete for the spot beside him. Still no word on Baby Van Buyten.
*GOLTV will air the DFL Supercup live on August 7 at 11:30 a.m. Eastern. Bayern Offside will have the liveblog.
*Saturday’s LIGA Total! Cup opponent 1. FC Koln lost to RC Lens 2-1 in a Monday friendly. Possible Sunday opponent Hamburger SV could only manage a 1-1 draw against 1860. Bayern Offside saw about half of the latter match, and it was not awe inspiring.
*Although Bayern Offside had a first look at the new away shirt more than a month ago, a photo leak with Bastian Schweinsteiger in the full kit was widely circulated across the web on Tuesday.
Let’s keep it short and to the point: Adding blue to the equation does not help the look.
Interestingly, the new shirt was already on sale Tuesday at a popular US based online shop (that I don’t want to plug, but you can find it easily enough) but was not available in FC Bayern’s fan shop. That’s got to be a first. Update: As of Wednesday morning in Munich, it’s available in the online Fan Shop.
*A couple of milestones were reached this week. Bayern Offside received it’s 14,000th comment; sadly though, more than half of those have been spam. Nevertheless, I salute those of you who have took the time to make 1 or 10 or 100 of the over 6,000 comments here–it’s you who makes this space a community.
Bayern Offside also got it’s 200th Twitter follower. Somewhat amazingly, this turned out to be Reiner Calmund! Given that Calmund follows over 47,000 Twitter pages, we’re glad something we’re doing caught his eye!
Greece Is Not the Word
It’s no secret that given recent economic and political developments, Greece is not held in high esteem by many Germans. Hamit Altintop took it to a new level though in a fluff piece in Everyone’s Favorite Tabloid. When asked what he would do if Doner didn’t exist, Altintop curtly replied:
Even then, I would not eat gyros.
Tomorrow: Deep insights continue when we get Demichelis’ thoughts on why Brazilian food sucks..or perhaps training video?
Video Highlights: SV Babelsberg 03 1:0 FC Bayern Munich II
By: Luke | Add Comments
Sunday was the season opener in the 3. Bundesliga for FC Bayern Munich’s amateur team. They traveled to Potsdam, on the outskirts of Berlin to take on SV Babelsberg 03. Though the home side has been in the 3rd division before, this was their debut match in the 3.Liga.
We’ve had a lot of nice things to say about David Alaba lately, but we’ll have to keep our mouths shut concerning what appears to be him on a misjudged header attempt on the Babelsberg goal.
Maximilian Haas served as captain for Bayern II in the absence of the injured Danny Schwarz. Interestingly, two players who saw action in Arco with the pros on Saturday (Kurz and Hajdarovic) also got into this match. It was sweet revenge for Babelsberg starter Tom Schütz: the former Bayern youth product had played the past 4 seasons with Bayern II, before notching 3 points against his old team on Sunday.
Bayern II will try to get into the win column on Saturday, when they will host a mini Bayern derby against Wacker Burghausen.
FC Bayern Munich 5:1 Trentino 11: Bayern Fitness Trainer Sees Significant Minutes in Victory
By: Luke | 10 Comments
FC Bayern Munich defeated a Trentino select team by a final score of 5:1 at the stadium in Arco, Italy today to wrap up their week-long training camp in Italy.
Jose Ernesto Sosa, (who has been pursued by at least 3 Italian sides this summer, but still finds himself riding back to Munich) opened the scoring for Bayern with goals in 7th and 18th minutes. Ivica Olic, serving as captain of the squad (and wearing jersey number 7) this day, got on the score sheet with a goal in the 30th, and Bayern took the 3-0 lead to halftime.
The Trentino 11 pulled one back in the 58th through Alessandro Poli, but there were mitigating circumstances: at halftime, Louis van Gaal pulled forward Nazif Hajdarovic off in favor of keeper Rouven Sattelmeier..leaving starting keeper Thomas Kraft to play as a center back. That’s one center back for Bayern that I’m willing to cut some slack. But the most interesting substitution was still to come.
We warned you this might happen-faced with a very thin roster of pros and amateurs, Louis van Gaal inserted fitness trainer Marcelo Martins into the match with 18 minutes to play. Martins who does have playing experience from his younger days, gave a good account of himself and played blunder-free football for his quarter hour plus, even taking a couple runs forward off the ball. I guess if the fitness drills suddenly get unbearably difficult with players dropping like flies in the coming days, we’ll know that Martins enjoyed his taste of first team action a little too much.
Ivica Olic slid in to add the fourth goal, while amateur trial player Boy Deul was grazed in the area late, and Andreas Ottl converted the penalty for the final score of 5-1.
Thanks to Bayern Offside readers who hung around despite a limited media offering-with these kinds of matches, you never know what you’re going to get. We did have live video in the 2nd half thanks to the helping hand of a commenter, so hopefully some of you got to enjoy that. Next Saturday and Sunday, it’s on to Gelsenkirchen and the LIGA Total Cup. We’ll probably be stream-hopping for that one as there does not appear to be a N. American broadcast planned for those matches. But before that, we have an interesting day tomorrow with the return of Ribery and Demichelis, and the opening amateur match of the season.
Scoring Recap:
1-0 Sosa, 7th minute
2-0 Sosa, 18th minute
3-0 Olic, 38th minute
3-1 Poli, 58th minute
4-1 Olic 80th minute
5-1 Ottl 86th minute (pen)
A bit of match action made it into this “highlights of the week” video. You’ll see one of Sosa’s goals, and yes, that is in fact Tymo wearing #2..I don’t think anyone was wearing the correct numbers today.
Here’s some additional spectator video from ground level.
Category: 1. Bundesliga, 3. Bundesliga, FC Bayern Munich, Live Blog, Matches, Players, Team News, VideosAll Hands On Deck: Bayern Add Trainer, Team Doctor to Squad for Saturday Friendly
By: Luke | 1 Comment
Following the departure of most of the amateurs for their opening 3. Liga match of the season, and an injury to Hamit Altintop, Louis van Gaal finds himself with only 7 pros to contest a friendly against a local side in Italy on Saturday. The solution: fitness trainer Marcelo Martins and team doctor Lutz Hänsel will now be part of the squad for the match! So, if Pranjic wants to get revenge for some training session that he thought was too hard, I suppose he can lead Martins long on every pass, making sure he gets in more than a good day’s worth of running. On the other hand, I have no idea who mans the magic spray bottle if your team doctor gets injured while playing..maybe he gets to carry it himself.
Will fitness trainer Marcelo Martins be forced to make his playing debut?
In reality, the small group of amateurs left behind should be enough to round out the roster, but the fact that they even have to consider using staff members to fill out a roster just underscores the preparation difficulties Louis van Gaal has encountered for the last month.
Bayern Offside will have LIVE coverage of the match from Arco, Italy beginning at 11 a.m. Eastern time on Saturday.
Category: 1. Bundesliga, 3. Bundesliga, FC Bayern Munich, FC Bayern Munich II, Matches, Photos, Players, Previews, Team NewsThursday’s Briefs: Altintop Goes Home Early, Saturday Friendly Looking More Dubious
By: Luke | 17 Comments
Young Guns
After a strong performance in the opening match, David Alaba could do little to help Austria’s U-19 team against France, who defeated the Austrians 5-0 on Wednesday. Bayern II’s Christoph Knasmüllner came into the match as a substitute in the 2nd half. Although Austria has not been mathematically eliminated, with 0 points and a goal difference of -6, the die is pretty well cast. Therefore, Bayern have recalled the pair to the club. Both will proceed directly to Munich, and will see action in the opening match of the season for Bayern II on Sunday.
The Long Wait for Sami?
Reports from Spain indicate the hang-up in the negotiations between Real Madrid and VfB Stuttgart over German international Sami Khedira is that Khedira has a “pre-agreement” with FC Bayern to come to Munich on a free transfer following this season. It may very well be so, but no one’s going to officially confirm it, obviously. If Real Madrid is willing to up Bayern’s generous salary offer the deal could still go through. Khedira would be a welcome and logical replacement for Mark van Bommel, who by nearly all accounts, is entering his final season with the club.
The Day in the Ribery Case
Some outlets reported on Thursday that Franck Ribery may facea a similar investigation in Germany to the one already well underway in France for his allegedly knowing rendezvous with an underage prostitute. The probe would focus on a meeting between the two in Munich for Ribery’s birthday this past winter. The Munich meeting appears to be a focus of the French case as well, with the allegation being Ribery would have learned of the prostitute’s age if he had arranged for her travel to Munich. Ribery is expected to rejoin team training on Monday following off-season groin surgery. Update: Very late on Thursday evening, everyone’s favorite tabloid published an extensive interview with Ribery, the first since his recent court appearance–click here for a translated version.
Full Part of an Empty House
Developments over the last few days suggest that Bayern are sending strong signals to several players that it may be in their best interests to more aggressively seek a transfer: the problem is–no one seems to want to leave. Having suggested earlier in the week that he wants to slim the roster down to last spring’s size, Van Gaal dropped a strong hint to Anatoliy Tymoshchuk that he might want to look elsewhere for employment. This followed a 60 second tirade directed at Jose Ernesto Sosa on Wednesday during the team’s training match, which was captured in this post. Van Gaal has further suggested that he really doesn’t need four forwards, and that either Gomez or Klose should look for a move; neither seem to be planning on it. For all the complaints directed at Louis van Gaal last year by players, it seems like an awful lot of them want to stick around. You can consider all the possibilities just like Louis van Gaal by consulting Spox.de’s massive Bayern roster analysis, which was posted today.
Ayew in Munich?
I wasn’t sure what to make of this Twitter feed for a while, but I’ve decided it must be authentic. Olympique Marseilles’ André Ayew, who starred for Ghana in the World Cup reported he was in Germany for meetings with the club. Ayew, who has been out on loan in France for the past two seasons, would seem like excess goods on the Bayern roster. A left-footed winger, he could probably only expect to contend for spot duty behind Ribery or Olic, although Bayern’s interest may indicate they planning for all contingencies with Ribery’s legal situation.
Small Team Getting Smaller
Reports Thursday indicated that Hamit Altintop was dealing with a thigh injury, and was unable to train with the team. He will now return to Munich in order to get fit in time for next weekend’s Liga TOTAL! Cup. Meanwhile, aspiring Bayern players are encouraged to show up at the the training ground on Saturday: With all the missing pro players, injuries, and the departure of the amateurs to prepare for their season opener, Bayern will struggle to cobble together 11 men for the planned friendly. It was reported that back-up keeper Thomas Kraft played right back for a portion of Wednesday’s training match due to the lack of bodies.
Seeing is Believing
Video is trickling out slowly from the camp. You can see a good summary of Monday’s practice below.
This channel has some brief comments from several players if you understand German.
Trikot Time
And finally, Bayern have revealed all the squad numbers for the coming season. Those of you who bought up a Kroos #39 two years ago will be happy to note that he again will wear #39 for Bayern. Breno takes over Willy Sagnol’s #2. See the full roster here.
Category: 1. Bundesliga, 3. Bundesliga, FC Bayern Munich, FC Bayern Munich II, Injuries, Matches, Players, Team News, Transfer Rumors, Videos
Tags: 1. Bundesliga, 3. Bundesliga, Anatoliy Tymoshchuk, Breno, Christoph Knasmüllner, David Alaba, Diego Contento, FC Bayern Munich, FC Bayern Munich II, Franck Ribéry, Hamit Altintop, Injuries, Louis van Gaal, Mario Gomez, Mark van Bommel, Matches, Miroslav Klose, Players, Team News, Transfer Rumors, VideosBayern in Italy: Fun With Captions
By: Luke | 3 Comments
A more appropriate entrance for Armin Veh perhaps, but Louis van Gaal exits boat and claims Trentino for Bayern..for this week.
Not many Inter fan clubs around it would seem, judging from the reception.
A: Oh *&#$ the Van der Wiel deadline is WEDNESDAY not Thursday! B: Sure, I get a free T-Mobile smartphone, but NO COVERAGE IN ITALY! C: Why did I give Demichelis my number?
Real training match action: Final score 11:9
LvG to Sosa: We're in Italy now, so why don't you just stay behind!
Don't believe for a minute that he's not having fun..
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