But such a victory remains highly improbable. Because once again, we were more or less treated to another drab 90 minutes with Bayern. Sure, there was a little less backward play, a little additional hustle up front (mainly in the form of Ivica Olic) but if not for some obviously below Champions League standard goalkeeping from Maccabi Haifa, we might very easily have been staring 0-0 in the eyes once again.

*Franz Beckenbauer’s pre-match comments that so many players have complained that there are “not many left” (who haven’t) and “Ribery wants to leave, Toni wants to leave, at the end I’ll have to play and that’s not so good.”(AP) are not exactly the lead in you’d like from the club president on the evening of his final match in that post. And yet it was the plainest, and perhaps the funniest appraisal of the situation yet.

*Ivica Olic specifically singled out an unfamiliar face for a congratulatory hug on the Bayern bench after he scored his goal. It was team physician Dr. Hans-Wilhelm Muller Wohlfahrt, who we can assume played a large part in his recent recovery.

*The downside of playing Holger Badstuber were on display in the first half, when the youngster tried to inject himself into the offense a bit and took a left footed shot that appeared to have a better shot of hitting the corner stick than the goal. It was just a continuation of his misery when anywhere near the goal, the Dortmund match been the most memorable.

*Although Mario Gomez was once again missing shots he should connect on, it was a bit better to see him actually trying to create at the edges of the area instead of sitting forward and waiting for the accurate cross that will never come. The goal opportunity was a product of this and a little luck, and we may have found our forward combo for the time being.

*Ribery and Toni were shown sitting together in the stands. So apparently Ribery was allowed out of quarantine. Or maybe Toni just wants out of Munich so bad he’s willing to contract swine flu.

*Reports of an unusual magnetic field descending in the Maccabi end are still being investigated, as almost every Bayern shot following the goal missed to the right by about a foot.

*Sunday’s match in Hannover will be shown on ESPN 360. However, because GOLTV and ESPN Deportes will be simulcasting Barcelona-Real Madrid, there will be no ESPN Deportes coverage.

Louis van Gaal will in all likelihood, be out of a job by the end of December. He could in fact, be out of a job a week from now, though I don’t believe anything will happen until at least next Monday, pending results of course. And yet, he will hardly be to blame. If his greatest sin is being a pedantic egotist, he is in fine company across the football coaching fraternity. Never mind the never-ending, though valid debate about whether the parts he’s been given actually fit together on the field. There is no debate about whether these players believe they belong together on the pitch. If they aren’t Dutch, or haven’t gained playing time this season, they’ve been ruthlessly selfish. Van Gaal himself seemed exasperated in his brief post match comments. So I went looking for advice that might be helpful.

Franck Ribery pretty much insisted from day one where he was going to play. And exactly how much fun he was going to have doing it.
The crying in some colicky babies begins after the feeding when they may have been either overfed or underfed. Extended crying before the feeding is seen with a hungry baby.

Luca Toni, whose presence on the field we were mercifully spared on Sunday, couldn’t even find it in him to apologize to the coach for leaving the stadium mid-match. Philipp Lahm took it upon himself to tell the world of all the ills he perceived behind the closed doors of FC Bayern. He followed up his critique with possibly his worst match ever in a Bayern uniform, and could only be thankful that Thomas Müller edged him out for worst man of the match. Still willing to keep patting Lahm on the back?
You may find that the periodic irritable baby can benefit from being held, or walked, or rocked. He may be comforted by another feeding. Or simply a pacifier in his mouth will give him comfort.

Mario Gomez decided his paycheck entitled him to minutes, whatever the situation.
Your fretful baby may have a harder time adjusting to a schedule. Usually they fuss the first three months, but soon become adjusted to the outside world and calm down later.

Martin Demichelis, who has a history of feeling entitlement, demanded his starting spot back. In a sign of Van Gaal’s weakening authority, he got it.
The baby has no other way to communicate his needs to eat except to cry.

Michael Rensing actually didn’t complain all that much, but it seems Van Gaal followed the proscribed advice for him.
A hypertonic baby is very jumpy and doesn’t relax well. This baby is bothered by sudden movements, loud noises, and sometimes is very uncomfortable in a tub bath. He may also have symptoms of colic or periodic irritable crying. If you suspect your baby is a hypertonic one, then he may be comforted by swaddling him in a receiving blanket.

Of course, all the above advice was excerpted from “Dr. Spock’s The First Two Years: The Emotional and Physical Needs of Children from Birth to Age 2.” I do try to resist the notion of calling a group of professional athletes a bunch of babies. But I was inspired to take this tack after reading a quote today from Holger Badstuber, who said in TZ (I am roughly translating) “Our fans are really extreme. That also doesn’t help us”. I could write a whole piece simply on how frustrating that was to read. But, I decided I would test my baby hypothesis instead. Pretty good results, no?

Oh, let us also not forget the injuries. The English language announcer in the ESPN 360 feed made a subtle swipe at Bayern’s “illustrious bench”, but did you see that list? Kraft, Ottl, Lell, Breno, Olic and Baumjohann. Altintop, all set to start according to kicker just before the match, pulled up lame in the warm up. How on earth do you implement your system with this group? Despite the team with seemingly endless depth now hardly having any, LVG tried. The use of Olic was just desperation, but in some ways Baumjohann was the best Bayern midfielder out there on Sunday.

Sight seen on Sunday: The Hoeness brothers conversing at halftime. Was Dieter putting a bug in Uli’s ear one way or the other about Lucien Favre? Or was Dieter asking if he could also get his mug on a commemorative scarf?

When meltdowns were fun
Since there was some chatter on our boards about Trapattoni the last couple days, and Louis van Gaal simply hasn’t done anything funny lately, here’s the best Trap meltdown remix, in my opinion

The quote
And so who spoke those rather harsh words? Louis van Gaal in his Barcelona days? Felix Magath on his way out the door? Well, it was none other than Ottmar Hitzfeld, commenting on the insubordinate Martin Demichelis, who refused to play in midfield in a 2008 match at Cottbus. Demichelis soon profusely apologized and went about his work helping set a Bundesliga record for fewest goals against. But these days, the apologies are rather hollow, and going about one’s work, not in the cards. Louis van Gaal can’t take the free kicks for you, boys.

Luca Toni’s “sort of” apology

Martin Demichelis tries to sound like a leader, fails then decides to tell us where he’d rather be

File under: Double up on Dutch
Beckenbauer and Hoeness begin preparing the hard landing for Louis van Gaal. Bonus: Doctor’s comment on Franck Ribery’s teeth.

From “who are you going to get?” to “I’m about to get fired”

Beckenbauer and Hoeness actually admit an error! (Warning-translation is pretty bad, best to read auf Deutsch if able)

File under: Somebody loves me
Expect to see more Holger Badstuber at left back.

Meanwhile, Badstuber returns the love to his coach.

Irresistible force vs. Immovable Object:
Bayern Munich are set to take on table-topper Bayer Leverkusen at 9:30 a.m. Eastern on Sunday. The match will be shown live at ESPN360.com and on ESPN Deportes.

Although the visitors from the northwest haven’t won in Munich in 20 years, that seems to be about the only stat in our favor. It’s hard to find a lot of weaknesses in Bayer Leverkusen’s game, and it may be even harder to find something bad to say about them, considering our erstwhile coach Jupp Heynckes has finally molded this maturing group into a consistent, competitive team. In contrast to Bayern’s transfer flops, Leverkusen made moderate, targeted purchases with Sami Hyypiä and Eren Derdiyok, which have stabilized a suspect defense and softened the blow of losing Patrick Helmes to injury quite nicely. Leverkusen will be without Simon Rolfes and Renato Augusto due to injury, and though the club was a bit unlucky in two draws to Dortmund and Schalke, step-in Stefan Reinartz scored his first Bundesliga goal in the last match against Frankfurt. Be sure to check out the Bayer 04 Offside for more on the match.

Bayern and Louis van Gaal enter the match with backs now firmly planted against the wall, but that won’t help the injury situation very much. Ribery is still out and Arjen Robben is now rated “very doubtful”. So much for the amazing healing powers. In addition, Edson Braafheid and Danijel Pranjic are both said to have “seasonal flu”. Could it be transfer-seasonal flu? Ivica Olic is still a week away, although progressing nicely. Perhaps the best chance of Bayern scoring is the fear of Miroslav Klose, who was cleared to return to practice Thursday after several days in quarantine because his children had swine flu. You never know, Rene Adler may have a Howard Hughes like fear of germs.

3 points for 3 points
So, what can Bayern do in this match to come away with a desperately needed 3 points? These things seem so basic, and yet we haven’t seen much of them.
1) Maintain a sustained attacking tempo.
Too often we have seen a 7 or 8 minute buildup in possession and attack disperse too easily. I don’t expect to see end to end action, despite Leverkusen’s new found confidence. Slop and speculation in the offensive end needs to be curtailed. As always, Schweini will be a key measure of this.
2) Stingy Butt
It’s so perfect actually, because I do have two meanings here. I want to see Mark Van Bommel really pushing the limits and putting people on their rear ends. Despite Leverkusen’s adept dead-ball skills, Bayern ultimately stand to benefit from controlling the pace and intimidating the visitors. In addition, we’ll need the best out of Jörg Butt, who despite seemingly not holding much of a grudge against his former employers, ought to find a way to get mad at them for 90 minutes.
3) Make Lemonade
Continue to give Braafheid and Altintop opportunities. These are players who do have the ability to create off the dead balls, and since there is no natural playmaker on the field without Robben, the frees and corners become all the more important. The last thing I want to see is Toni/Gomez trotting on in the 70th minute to add a 3rd striker who flops around for 20 minutes creating nothing.

The Toni we need
Of late, it’s been Bayern’s own Toni Kroos who’s been garnering the headlines and the highlight videos for Bayer 04. With 3 goals in the last 5 matches, and two highlight reelers among them, the still-only 19 year old is progressing nicely. Of course there will be a danger that Kroos will never come back to Bayern, especially after his oft-promised future #10 was given to Arjen Robben. Undoubtedly, Rudi, Jupp, Uli and Christian will sit down for a little chat on the subject this weekend. However, I don’t think putting him on loan was such a bad idea at the time. At a basic level, Kroos needed to play. It’s perhaps only a shame that Bayer is not playing in Europe this season, although Kroos did get some seasoning the UEFA Cup campaign two seasons ago. Kroos gives his own rather unrevealing views to the official Bayer 04 website in an interview posted today.

Always looking forward
One thing to remember when pining for Toni Kroos-the great teams don’t just have potential stars, they have potential constellations. And while Bayern II may sit 20th and last in the 3. Liga at present, there are still things to get excited about. Presenting: David Alaba

Clearly, I don’t want to write a match review. I’d simply make two points about the match itself. It was a relative slight improvement at least over the Bordeaux match, and also you could pretty much see the Hoffenheim or Bremen match as pretty reasonable facsimiles of the performance.

All the frenzy and attention has mostly been given to Philipp Lahm (see Jan’s superb initial summary here), but I want to start out by talking about Luca Toni. It’s quite surprising to me that most commentators are willing to gloss over this quitter’s command performance. In fact, I am even inclined to say that in American sports, Toni’s actions would be seen as more detrimental to the team than Lahm’s. Once again, the Schalke match was the catalyst for a superstar quitting on the team. Last season against Schalke, when Ribery earned a red card, I was sure his career at Bayern was over. I was convinced the board would stick with Klinsmann, simply because they had invested so much in him, and it was clear that Ribery gave up on the team on that occasion. Stranger things have happened but Luca Toni gave up on this team on Saturday, and no matter who is sitting on the bench in January, Toni needs to be handed his walking papers during the break. Even if Bayern are required to subsidize his entire salary, it would be better for him to watch his World Cup dreams die in his homeland than have him moping around the Sabener Strasse another 7 months. It might have been a lot different with Toni. As comedic in his pratfalls as thrilling in his goal scoring prowess (once), he might have carved out a unique, enduring image in an already large pantheon of Bayern characters. But it seems to all have come to an end with a whimper, and years from now we’re likely to remember Toni sort of like this:

“Remember Luca Toni, that one year?”
“Yeah”
“What happened to him?”
“Well, he kinda got old, I guess, just fizzled out”

At least Toni is lucky enough that we probably won’t remember he just packed up his bags in the middle of a match.

Philipp Lahm is right. But Philipp Lahm is wrong.
The small man with the now-big voice is drawing praise from all quarters for his intellectual challenge to the Bayern board on a host of fronts. But I think there are two points being overlooked here. First, Lahm’s critique doesn’t immediately validate every piece of criticism that comes from every know-it-all writer or fan. Second, the board is absolutely correct in deeming Lahm’s actions an “absolute taboo” and substantially fining him. You have to question what Lahm was hoping to accomplish by taking his admittedly nuanced and generally accurate views to the court of public opinion. Did he just wish to fan the flames a bit more so that an inferno takes hold at the annual meeting in a couple weeks? Does he think his opinion matters enough to alter the viewpoints of a very stubborn though very successful leadership? Was he simply tired, as a native Munchener, of being confronted by the man on the street with “Hey, what the hell is up with the team, Philipp?” and in a moment of frustration decided to let his mouth run? On Monday, Lahm met with the board, and the club issued a classically understated “everyone has kissed and made up” statement. But this one’s going to reverberate for a while. For me, it brought up a few opinions:

1) It’s easy to forget how injured this team has been. When Louis van Gaal is criticized for his constant lineup changes, it is rarely realized how many of these he has been forced into. With the exception of Gomez, all of the strikers have been injured (I also happen to believe Klose was injured much more severely early on than has been made known publicly). You’ve had serious injuries with Robben, Ribery and Van Bommel. Demichelis and Braafheid, while probably less critical, are also injuries that have weakened depth. The team has probably been lucky to dodge a couple bullets with Daniel van Buyten’s injuries occurring at just the right time. Bottom line: If we’d have played the entire season with the lineup available against Wolfsburg or Dortmund, even at a median level of form, we’re probably neck and neck with Leverkusen.

2) It is only natural that there is a sense of a “team philosophy” vacuum in the current moment. The leadership is somewhat in transition, with Nerlinger still finding his role within the club. The club simply can’t recover from hiring Klinsmann and gearing its policies towards his nebulous philosophy quickly enough to give LVG all the raw material he needs immediately. The timeline of decisions and purchase agreements supports this. I believe the only real unmitigated transfer disaster thus far has been Pranjic, although I do believe Pranjic was brought in more a) as a hedge just in case Ribery was sold and b) to serve in more of a Brazzo/jack-of-all-trades role. It seems commentators harp on the Gomez transfer. Why buy him when you have Toni? Well of course, Gomez was bought to replace Toni. That the club might enjoy a season of having extraordinary depth at the position doesn’t seem ridiculous to me.

3)It is all good and fine to criticize the management for not appreciating the precept that a team is not just a sum of its parts, and also for not addressing critical needs. We sat here all summer in awe that they didn’t acquire a keeper and a right back. But what was missing from Lahm’s comments, and what is of vital importance is that at some level these players need to take responsibility. Because despite whatever mismatched parts may have to link up on the pitch in any given week, this team is still far too talented and creative to turn in this string of results. I would like to have heard a lot more about what Philipp Lahm can do better than what everyone else can do.

Much of what I’ve argued above is the reason why I will continue to stand behind Louis van Gaal. Of course, I won’t shed a tear if we’re 10 points back at the break and the board decides to can him as well. But, the problem is on the field, not on the bench. And I’m afraid Lahm’s criticisms, while quite valid, are endemic to this moment in time at the club, as a result of the coaching changes. It’s just too simple to say “Hey, Hoeness and Rummenigge don’t know what they are doing”. If that were the case, no one would have selected Bayern as their preseason favorite, but virtually everyone did. But what Lahm might have been trying to say in his way, and what I might be trying to say in mine, is that there have been mistakes made, mistakes of a sort that have to run their course and aren’t fixable immediately.

But back to the business at hand. Babbel finds himself on somewhat similar footing to Lucien Favre before the ax fell in Berlin. After an improbable, (though admittedly less surprising) charge to the top of the standings in the 2nd half of last season for which he was given much credit, it may be his club’s inability to gel with new parts that has withered the spirit of last season’s rise. Babbel appears to be pretty far out on the plank, despite “votes of confidence”. This is a team that has lost 3 in a row in the league, and only managed to beat Freiburg and Frankfurt. And we know well that you don’t even need to be at your best to manage this feat. And while the numbers bear out that Stuttgart has indeed put forward effort, especially with regard to it’s last two losses against Schalke and Hannover, the squad looked sloppy and careless in its midweek Pokal loss to Greuther Fürth.

It won’t get any easy with the Bavarians coming to town, especially with Cacau and Sami Khedira out, while Ciprian Marica remains a question mark. Babbel has faced Bayern twice as Stuttgart coach, losing in humiliating fashion at home is last year’s DFB Pokal, and in Munich on the final matchday last season. You can track more of the story over at the Stuttgart Offside.

As for Bayern, the match will have special meaning for Mario Gomez, returning to his long-time home for the first time. Frankly, I’m a bit tired of young Bayern strikers being a little too sentimental for their old teams but perhaps we’ll be spared Mario laying face down and crying for Stuttgart if he actually scores a goal.

Almost lost in the shuffle of other news was the fact that Arjen Robben has been declared doubtful for the match. This seems a little bit surprising, considering he’s had a week to work up his fitness since the first Frankfurt match. Louis van Gaal indicated that he’d like to save him for the Bordeaux match, but frankly, I think Robben needs to be ready to contribute if the match is still competitive in the last half hour.

I expect Stuttgart to come out fired up, so the main thing is for the team to maintain its composure and not make any stupid mistakes in the first 15 minutes or so. Once we sustain the initial pressure, we ought to have the creativity and one on one advantage to produce the chances to win the match. I’m calling 2-1 for Bayern.

Demichelis drops turd in punch bowl
So after a 4-0 win in which we actually looked like Bayern, everyone’s happy right? Not so fast! Martin Demichelis didn’t take long to start complaining very publicly about his role at the club. First of all, let’s explain a few things to Micho. Comparing your situation to Mark van Bommel’s is like comparing Rotkohl and Spargel. For one, Micho, you are not the captain of the team! Your name is not Martin van Demichelis (don’t think that doesn’t make a difference!) I’m not at all certain Van Bommel would have come back into the lineup as quickly if it weren’t for the fact that we’ve been forced into playing a 4-4-2. Plus, you didn’t have to go play with the amateurs like Van Bommel and Toni were forced to do before coming back. And finally, are you really going to argue that your presence on the pitch is more valuable or deserved than Daniel van Buyten’s at the moment? Because I don’t think LVG is going to stick your right-footed ass in Herr Badstuber’s place. Ah, that’s better. Now, go help keep a clean sheet against Bordeaux and maybe we’ll think about letting you out of the Bayern Offside doghouse.

For his part, Sosa greeted the news humbly. “I cannot complain. My fellow players have always treated me fairly. I just did not use my chances,” he told the club website.

Sosa came to Munich in 2007 for a fee of 6 mil. Euros. He managed just 2 goals and 1 assist in 35 Bundesliga matches over the last 2 1/4 seasons, and undoubtedly the critics will point to him as just another example of Bayern’s poor personnel decisions over the last few years.

But his place in Bayern lore will always be secure, because of one magical moment in Madrid. It was Sosa who delivered the cross to Luca Toni, who headed in Bayern’s third goal in the dying seconds of extra time to earn a 3-3 draw and passage through on the away goals rule, completing the most improbable and emotional of comebacks against Getafe in the UEFA Cup in 2008. Long live the one shining moment of Jose Ernesto Sosa.

1) I looked at Frankfurt’s goal about 7 times on replay, and the best that I can come up with, is that it really was a freakish chance. Maybe Lahm gave up on his pursuit a little easily, maybe Van Bommel and Van Buyten were a little clumsy and slow to react, but overall, that was just a weird one.

2) I expressed a lot of frustration with Bastian Schweinsteiger in this space last week, and in the liveblog as well. I will continue to do so, until he finds some consistency in his game. His slow and sloppy play on Saturday was a major contributor to a scoreless first half. It continues to be all or nothing with Schweini, and I’m not sure what can be done to get him back to the consistent form that he has shown in the past. On the other end of the spectrum, a not quite ready for prime time Arjen Robben was ready enough. He more or less stole a goal from Gomez (ok, maybe Mario would have found a way to muff the rebound too), but his appearance changed the whole pace of the match, as we’ve come to expect.

3) As was well discussed in the liveblog, our set piece play is awful. There isn’t a lot of point in penetrating and earning frees and corners if the team doesn’t know what it wants to do with them (see Schweini and Tymo) or doesn’t execute them well (see Van Buyten, Pranjic, and to a lesser degree, Badstuber). I’m not sure what can be done to improve it, aside from Ribery scoring more amazing goals like the one in Dortmund.

4) Almost universally, those of us in the liveblog were incredibly disheartened by Louis van Gaal’s decision to sub in Demichelis for Toni. It seemed to be a “let’s not lose the 1 point” substitution. None of us realized that he was actually putting Van Buyten forward, and I watched it again to see if I had just been distracted. As it was, Daniel hardly appears on-screen in the broadcast until the 2nd goal is scored. So, this may be a case where a spectator might have had a better idea of what was going on than an international TV viewer. At any rate, LVG deserved neither praise nor scorn for the substitution. Of course, he’s a genius if it works. And he’s an idiot if it doesn’t. Not that he would ever admit the latter. So, the goal was luck, but not pure luck. Any statistical analysis bears out that Bayern had a ton of chances throughout the match, and to some degree that indicates making a lot of your own luck.

5) Strangely, it would be easy to skip over the man of the match: Thomas Müller. Of course, his skillful header set up Daniel van Buyten for the game winner, but it was his cross in to Gomez that set up the equalizer as well. When he is not the only one finishing chances, he seems to be the only one setting them up. After a rocky, foul-ridden start, he straightened out his game and was the best player on the field again for Bayern.

Pokal-Spiel live on ESPN 360
You will not be seeing a rerun! Wednesday’s German Cup match at Eintracht Frankurt will be shown live on ESPN 360, and we will be running a liveblog here at the Bayern Offside. Continental Europe is only 5 hours ahead of the Eastern time zone this week, so the match will take place at 3:30 p.m. Eastern time. There is a chance we’ll be able to pipe a feed of the match into the liveblog. So those of you without ESPN 360, please come by, and we’ll try to accommodate you! We should see the same starting 11 for Bayern.

In the news
With all the stories swirling around Schalke’s possible emergency fire sale, it was only a matter of time before the Manuel Neuer rumors started again. Günther Jauch (who made an appearance in this space as the graphic presence of the “Who Wants to be a Goal Scorer” entry), claimed he had a good source that told him that Neuer to Bayern was a done deal in the winter break. Felix Magath was quick to deny it once again. Whether Jauch, who is not exactly a Gelsenkirchen insider is on to something or not, I think the story of this transfer is not if, but when.

Reunion with Klinsmann this weekend?
With Stuttgart falling prey to Fürth in the Pokal on Tuesday, the Markus Babbel death-watch is on. Babbel still has a job as of this writing. Although Marcel Koller seems to be the most frequently-linked name to the Stuttgart job, some sources are pointing to a meeting between Klinsmann and Stuttgart President Erwin Staudt. Ok, this is probably the worst kind of rumor mongering, but maybe the only thing better than seeing the lame duck Babbel on the sideline against us on Saturday would be the confused-looking Klinsmann trying to put Alex Hleb in touch with his inner chi….or something.

So begins our twilight-zoney pairing with Frankfurt, who we will see again midweek in the Pokal. From the injury desk, Bayern will be without Braafheid, Breno, Olic and Ribery. Robben’s status has not been declared publicly. He is said to be fit although Louis van Gaal has indicated that Robben won’t start under any circumstance. It remains to be seen whether LVG will use any shock-therapy type benchings as a response to Wednesday’s loss, but as I’ve indicated, I would like to see Schweini out of the lineup.

Eintracht comes into the match having defeated Hannover 2-1 last weekend. Of course, I never consider Hannover a useful measuring stick. That match was preceded by combined 0-5 losses to Schalke and Stuttgart. The club has shown a marginal improvement under Michael Skibbe, and an opening day defeat of Bremen seemed to establish some early confidence that has waned a bit. Frankfurt will be without forward Ioannis Amanatidis, their leading scorer. Greek compatriot Nikolaos Liberopoulos, himself a proven Bundesliga scorer, will likely take his place in a 4-1-4-1 formation for the visitors. However, let’s also keep in mind that Eintracht’s one goal against Bayern last season was scored by Martin Demichelis.

Once again, Bayern will likely be faced with a packed defense that will swarm to the back. The advantage may come from Frankfurt’s penchant for fouling. Their match with Schalke reads like a street fight. Not unexpectedly, their frequent fouling has contributed to 3 red cards so far this season. Whether or not an opponent gets sent off, expect more set piece opportunities this week than we saw against Cologne and Freiburg, and let’s hope we have the personnel on the field to take advantage of them. I’m expecting a spirited response from the squad and I’ll predict a 3-1 victory.

Why you shouldn’t panic
Following the Pokal match in Frankfurt and next weekend’s visit to Stuttgart, Bayern fall into a very fortunate scheduling situation: they will play consecutive Champions League and Bundesliga matches at home. Add to that an international week, and you will see that Bayern’s next away match is not until November 29..in Hannover. Essentially, an entire month at home. The only other away match on the Bundesliga schedule in this calendar year is in Bochum. Additionally, the best way to move up the table is by head to head victories over those above you. A win tomorrow may do very little in resetting the table, but beating Leverkusen and Schalke (and you may have fair skepticism about accomplishing that, I grant you) in those back to back home matches would do quite a bit to realign the table to a more familiar order. The tabloid press are really enjoying the Van Gaal-Klinsmann comparison right now. Well, there may be another. Starting October 18 last season, Bayern went on a 5 match Bundesliga win streak and didn’t miss taking a single point at home the rest of the calendar year. The streak began after the infamous Bochum debacle, in which two late goals gifted the visitors a point. All deficiencies considered, when you weigh being at home for a month, I think things are about to take a turn for the better.

Let’s get the red out of our eyes and back into our kits where it belongs. Here’s 9 thoughts on a match ending with 9 men:

1) Jörg Butt had the night of his life, and he probably won’t ever get to really enjoy it because of the result. For American football fans, it might have felt something like Drew Bledsoe standing on the sideline watching Tom Brady win him a Super Bowl ring. That they were not the best struck Elfers of all time is beside the point. Under most other circumstances, we would be hailing him from the rooftops. We still might; file this one away if goal difference ends up coming into play.

2) I can forgive Thomas Müller. I really can. This club has asked so much of a very young player, and all the dead wood around him could learn a lot from his example, most of the time. It was unfortunate that we had, by my count, 8 brain-dead players on the pitch in first half, 2 comatose ones and Mueller. Give me the guy playing with energy any day. I’ll live, and he’ll learn.

3) I said in the live blog I was hoping we would hear the right comments from the team after the match. I was duly impressed. Rummenigge especially had it about exactly right. Louis van Gaal knows football. I don’t know if he knows how to fix this team, but I think he’s got the right diagnosis.

4) Schweinsteiger needs to get acquainted with the bench, immediately. He slows up the attack, he gives the ball away way too much, and you can’t even use him for a corner anymore. Time to trot out Sosa again.

5) I really can’t forgive Daniel Van Buyten. I know what he was trying to do, but that foul in that spot at that time in the match was just irresponsible. At least he picked the right time in the injury timetable to do it, now let’s hope Micho doesn’t rupture a hamstring in the next couple weeks.

6) Those of you who have been clamoring for more Luca Toni: I am on your side. I don’t think he’s going to start scoring like a Bosnian anytime soon, but I think he still has a lot to contribute. And let’s face it, he hasn’t used up all his facial expressions yet.

7) The Altintop/Lahm experiment really didn’t end up getting a fair evaluation as a result of events. I thought Altintop showed some good energy very early on (first 10 minutes) and that was about it. But, I was still glad and I did feel it was right decision over adding Pranjic on the left.

8 We don’t know for sure yet if Arjen Robben will be able to take the field on Saturday, but with the new reports of Franck Ribery being out up to an additional month
he will feel the pressure like never before to lead this team out of the wilderness. Unlike certain other expensive transfer acquisitions this season, I think he may very well be able to do just that.

9) Tomorrow: A preview of the match against Frankfurt and the reasons why we shouldn’t be grumbling about a crisis.