Before the round of 16 first leg in the Champions League at Paris Saint-Germain, Oliver Kahn spoke in the debate about head coach Julian Nagelsmann. For the chairman of the board of FC Bayern, the Munich trainer is, as always, under special observation, but by no means available.
Oliver Kahn made it clear to “Amazon Prime Video” before the kick-off on Tuesday evening at PSG that progressing in the knockout phase against the Paris star ensemble was the clearly formulated goal for the German record champions: “We all here at FC Bayern want this success . We’re all under a certain amount of pressure here. The players have to deliver, the manager wants to deliver. Our fans expect us to play a great game here.”
At the same time, Kahn also emphasized that Munich’s head coach was not questioned in the Bundesliga, despite some moderate performances: “It’s a bit exaggerated to always focus on the coach.”
Bayern boss can set stimuli
Julian Nagelsmann had been criticized several times in the past few weeks. Sometimes it was about the dispute with captain Manuel Neuer in the course of the dismissal of long-time goalkeeping coach Toni Tapalovic, sometimes it was about public statements by the 35-year-old after Bayern games – like most recently after the 3-0 home win against VfL Bochum.
In addition, the Munich team had not met their own expectations in the first weeks of the Bundesliga, when they had only drawn three times in a row.
For CEO Oliver Kahn, however, the quarrels, some of which are held in public, are not a cause for major concern. “At Bayern there’s always the question: Do you want too much harmony? Maybe a bit of excitement isn’t wrong either. There are always discussions and that always creates a certain unrest. That’s what I mean by excitement,” he said former goalkeeper and longtime captain of Munich.
According to Kahn, there are often discussions at management level at FC Bayern: “If it’s too harmonious: is it really what we need at certain moments to really explode and call up everything?”