A few years ago nobody wanted to travel to Munich. Nowadays, teams are looking forward to duels against Bayern.
“It’s now the case that when you come to the Allianz Arena, you already have this feeling: you’re afraid that you’ll be led to the slaughter.” This statement comes from Thomas Eichin, the former manager of SV Werder Bremen, who was a guest on Sport1’s “Doppelpass” in November 2015. The day before, FC Bayern, hosts of the “Schlachtbank” Allianz Arena, had outclassed VfB Stuttgart 4-0. From the Swabians’ perspective, the result was still a grateful one given Bayern’s 33 shots on goal.
At that point, the record champions had scored 34 out of 36 possible points after twelve match days. Successful coach Pep Guardiola and his team were on their way to their third championship in a row.
Thomas Eichin knew what he was talking about when he talked about the slaughterhouse. In the previous season, Werder lost 6-0 in Munich.
Bremen defender Sebastian Prödl then also commented on the debacle against Guardiola’s Bayern with a comparison: “Munich is like going to the dentist. Everyone has to go there. It can hurt a lot. But it can also end lightly.” Prödl’s statement would later be named sports quote of the year. And Bremen lost 5-0 in Munich five months after Eichin’s quote.
The fear of Bayern is gone
Eight and a half years later, the “slaughter bench” has been dismantled and the dentist appointment has been cancelled. Anyone traveling to Munich has real hope of winning. Anyone who meets FC Bayern will go into the game bravely.
This has been seen often enough in the past few weeks. For example, when Werder Bremen stole three points from Munich at the end of January after a 1-0 win. Or two weeks ago, when VfL Bochum beat Bayern 3-2 in their own stadium. Or last Friday, when SC Freiburg dominated the first 30 minutes against the defending champions and fought for a point even after being 2-1 down – and was rewarded (you can read the match report here).
The fear of Bayern is gone. This made the difference for years and paralyzed many an opponent before kick-off. Udo Lattek, FC Bayern’s long-time coach, coined the sentence in the 1980s: “The fear of the opponent is also Bayern’s strength.”
Where there used to be fear, there is now anticipation. Everyone in the league wants to annoy Bayern and rarely has the chance to do so been as great as it is right now. Coach Thomas Tuchel’s team has seemed so harmless and uncreative since the turn of the year. In the first series, Munich won 4-0 against Bremen, 7-0 against Bochum, 8-0 against Darmstadt and 4-0 against Dortmund. At the moment the team seems to be miles away from such results.
“We don’t need to talk about it today”
Stars in a crisis of form, a coach who was dismissed in the summer and who only seems to be able to reach the team in certain situations, and unrest surrounding expiring player contracts all contribute to FC Bayern not seeming like itself at the moment. Hardly anyone is thinking about the championship given that they are seven points behind league leaders Leverkusen, who can extend their lead to ten points in the derby against Cologne on Sunday. Sports director Christoph Freund responded to a question about the Bundesliga title on Friday with: “We don’t need to talk about it today.”