Leon Goretzka has once again become a fixture in FC Bayern’s midfield this season. This was no longer a given, as he had temporarily lost his regular place with the German football champions. The national player now provided rare insights into how he dealt with this difficult phase.
In the current season, Leon Goretzka is absolutely set under head coach Thomas Tuchel. The 28-year-old has already made 17 competitive appearances in the current season. The Bayern star was not only used in central midfield as a box-to-box player, but also had to help out as a central defender in some games.
In the previous season, Goretzka found himself on the Bayern bench more often, and there was even speculation about a departure from Munich. The native of Bochum now commented on possible requests for a change in the “ZDF-Sportstudio”: “No, looking back, it was a very good decision on my part that I didn’t let it get to me like that. I was 100 percent convinced that I was the one can help the team next year. I stuck to myself.”
So far in 2023/2024, Coach Tuchel has relied entirely on the versatile midfielder, who returned after just two weeks after breaking his hand in October, but until recently still had to play with a splint on his left hand.
Goretzka admits: “Not an easy time”
For Goretzka personally, things were extremely poor from a sporting perspective until the summer break this year – both at FC Bayern and in the national team.
He himself made no secret of the fact that last season’s failures were quite detrimental: “The year ended very badly for me or for all of us in the national team with the elimination from the World Cup and we carry that with us into the new year And also the second half of the season at Bayern with the elimination in the cup against Freiburg and the elimination in the Champions League against City. I was certainly not at my performance limit. […] So it wasn’t an easy time.”
Before the 2023/2024 season, Goretzka felt a high level of motivation to get back to his best level physically. This is now benefiting him, as he himself stated: “I stuck to myself, did my things, trained as best as I could, got myself into good physical shape. And then I started the season well again.”