Visine, stat!
By: Luke | October 22nd, 2009Let’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.
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Tags: Arjen Robben, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Champions League, Daniel van Buyten, FC Bayern Munich, Franck Ribéry, Hamit Altintop, Injuries, Joerg Butt, Jose Ernesto Sosa, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, Luca Toni, Matches, Philipp Lahm, Recaps, Team News, Thomas MuellerSubscribe
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Comments | Add your comment
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Honestly, Bordeaux didn’t play their best game either. They missed two penalties.
But, again, I am getting tired of people saying that they are ’surprised’ at the result. I’m not. Bordeaux is a great team! Of course, you will hear the old ‘we are missing this player and we are missing that player’. Well, if you don’t have depth (which Bayern does) you suffer.
At least many Liverpool fans admit they lost to a good team.
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Luca Toni was awsome though!
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United States -
I agree with your assessment, Luke. Luca Toni was the only player who showed any moxie. Fitting for the player who almost single-handedly save Bayern against Getafe. He almost got Bayern the draw too. He’s earned starting points over Gomez in my book for now.
I also agree that Kalle was on the mark with his assessment, but do you notice how tempered it was, or is being made out to be? Quite unlike how Effe, Ollie or Lizarazu would react or Beckenbauer’s lambasting of the team that lost to Lyon in the 00-01 season: http://test.breakingnews.ie/sport/ojsnaugb/
The problem is that the players do not seem mature enough to up their game or provide a sufficient response to such performances consistently. In that regard, the old guard has not been effectively replaced. Now, I’m not calling for yet another overhaul of the team, but however respected vBommel might be, he’s no Effe or Ollie (back in the day). Nor are a lot of the other players. One could always count on Lizarazu, Sagnol or Brazzo. Bayern needs players who walk the walk after talking the talk. Everyone’s saying the right things, but it’s not translating into a proportionate showing on the pitch.
Remember when Magath sent Schweini to the reserves even when he had good showings for die Mannschaft? Van Gaal could send a few players down and not hear a peep from the fans. I think Bayern also needs a training ground bust-up. Something to light the fire under the seat of the players’ pants.
Finally, I will say that I’m not grumbling about a crisis. This is more of an endemic.
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@Dave Trotter: Did you read Luke’s post or even the match preview at all? Your comment sounds like you just needed to randomly vent your frustrations and now accuse Bayern fans of being “surprised” they lost, while they are simply disappointed but neither in the run up nor in the aftermath of the match I read something suggesting they were expecting Bayern to thrash Bordeaux or that they had no respect for the team or anything. Take it easy.
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Luke, you had some good points on Bayern and some that I agree with, however there are a few that I don’t agree with. How in the world do Bayern gain by benching Schweini? Enlighten me on this please! Schweini isn’t the fastest guy out there on the pitch, but if you believe Sosa is faster or better in any way you haven’t been watching Bayern or the Mannschaft play! Schweini plays HARD every match and runs his butt off for Bayern, he plays defense and tackles and goes forward very well, yes his dribbling and touch are not at the highest level like a Xavi or Inesta, but Bayern do NOT have somebody better on the bench right now to replace him. Scweini has a long range shot that is powerful and can make great runs into the box to score in an open game. Sosa is in no way, shape or form the level of player Schweini is and that is why he is on the bench. Did Schweini have a bad night at Bordeaux? Yes he did, but then so did a half dozen others on the team and that led to the loss.
I can’t forgive Van Buyten either for that useless red card two minutes from time, it just didn’t make sense, Bayern would have been better off if he had just let him go and he scored because the one goal wouldn’t have changed the loss. And if Van Buyten has to sit out the return leg at Allainz Arena against Bordeaux just how much does that hurt Bayern’s defense? Huge loss, Van Buyten has been the rock that has held the back four together this season and the most consistent performer on defense. Muller made a big error too by getting a red, but his I can understand because he is young and was going for it, albeit a bit too much from the ref’s veiwpoint. He should learn from this lesson I hope and hopefully his absence will not hurt us.
Toni did some good things in that game against Bordeaux and almost got an equaliser at the end and maybe his scoring touch will come back, the negative though is that he is a back to the goal guy 90% of the time and not a great dribbler or very fast with the ball so posession and lay offs are not his specialty. The problem is that Gomez hasn’t done much lately and LvG is going to give Toni his shot and hopefully Gomez doesn’t go into a shell because he isn’t starting!
Luke take a look at the Bordeaux tape and tell me how well you thought our midfield played? Tell me how many times the midfield brought the ball up into Bordeaux’s half and provided good service to Klose/Toni and Muller? There pretty much wasn’t any service for most of the game and our shots on goal total show that. There were huge gaps in the midfield to the strikers and we had far too many long balls to Klose/Toni that don’t work 90% of the time. Van Bommel and Tymo were horrible in this game and should never be on the pitch at the same time IMO because the are both too similiar, Tymo was so far back that I thought he was a defender and both of them are slow in build up on the passing game and neither want to attack just pass back and forth till someone else takes it forward. If LvG wants Van Bommel as the CHM fine, but then the other three mids need to be players that are fast and quick going forward or the attack slows down too much. Once Ribery and robben are back this won’t be an issue, but now it is and the right combo in midfield needs to be out there ready and motivated to go full tilt.
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