After the big fuss about the interview with their goalkeeper Manuel Neuer, the FC Bayern Munich players reacted with great relief to the 4-2 win at VfL Wolfsburg in the Bundesliga.
“The most important thing is that we took the lead in the table. We celebrated a must-win today. We withstood the pressure of having to win,” said substitute captain Thomas Müller after the game.
1. FC Union Berlin had briefly overtaken Bayern the day before with a 2-1 win over FSV Mainz 05. The German champions had to give their sporting answer in the middle of a phase in which almost everything in Munich revolved around Neuer’s massive criticism of the club’s management.
The currently injured 36-year-old had attacked Bayern bosses in interviews over the club’s split from close friend and goalkeeping coach Toni Tapalovic. CEO Oliver Kahn and sports director Hasan Salihamidzic rejected this very clearly.
“The resistance we faced today wasn’t that small. So a big compliment to the team,” said national player Leon Goretzka.
Nagelsmann annoyed by questions about Neuer
And Müller also added: “The start of the year was perhaps a bit too much for topics that didn’t relate to sport. But you can take the last two games as proof that that shouldn’t and shouldn’t influence us as a football team really influenced.”
After the game, coach Julian Nagelsmann repeated his criticism of Neuer, which he had voiced in a “DAZN” interview before kick-off. As far as the separation from Tapalovic is concerned, he “disclosed everything in a detailed and extremely honest one-to-one conversation” with Neuer. However, he will not comment publicly on this.
“I would not have done the interview. In one passage you can read that Bayern Munich is the focus. Completely separate from me personally, it was not beneficial for the club in terms of calm. You can see that from the fact that I have 17 questions now 16 on the subject.” That’s another reason why “victory stands above everything today”.