Vincent Kompany is the focus of FC Bayern’s Champions League. Rightly so. Because he made mistakes.
After the 2: 2 in the quarter -final secondary in the Champions League at Inter Milan, the bitterly from FC Bayern is sealed. The big dream of the final in your own arena burst in San Siro. For Vincent Kompany, it was his largest exam as a Bayern coach. From a sober point of view, he failed. In the end, Inter turned out to be more ripped off and clever team.
But it’s not just a slip. The flaw runs like a red thread through Bavaria’s season and became particularly clear in the Champions League: only the defeat at Aston Villa (0: 1), then in Barcelona (1: 4), in Rotterdam (0: 3) and finally against Inter (1: 2) last week, which was now sealed after 2-2 in Milan. In addition, there is the arduous 1: 1 in the playoff second leg against Celtic Glasgow. This is not a balance of an absolute top team that can win the premier class.
No wonder that Kompany is now the focus of the criticism. Already the day before the decisive second leg, he had to put up with the question at the press conference to what extent failure in the quarter-finals could possibly have an impact on his future as a Bayern coach. In fact, he made mistakes. Nevertheless, general doubts about him would now be premature and inappropriate.
His mistakes are obvious: In the first leg against Inter Milan, he recently switched the completely overwhelmed Sacha Boey, who made the mistake of 1: 2 in the final accounting. Company himself with his ambition to want to win the first leg after the late equalizer to 1-1, contributed to this. For the risk that he continued to take with his continued extremely offensive tactics, he was bitterly punished with the goal that fell after a counterattack.
Incidentally, Thomas Müller scored the important goal to 1-1, whom he first set on the replacement bank in the first leg and only replaced after 74 minutes. Not relying on him and his experience from the start was another failure of the trainer. Kompany confidently confessed with Müller’s starting elomination in the second leg.
However, the conditions in the crucial season phase were also difficult: With captain Manuel Neuer, Alphonso Davies, Dayot Upamecano, Jamal Musiala, Hiroki ITō and Kingsley Coman, Kompany’s most important service providers had said goodbye to his squad due to injury in the past few weeks. Company tried to defy these conditions at the end – in the end in vain.
However, the Belgian is still still enjoying the bosses full trust. He is on the best way to reach the declared minimum goal of this season with the championship. After the bitter out in the Champions League and already in the round of 16 of the DFB Cup, the master shell is only a kind of consolation.
Although the season was mixed, the young coach in Munich, at 39, has already done a lot. Kompany has returned Bavaria to an identity with the offensive and dominance football he practiced. The self-confident Mia-San-Mia idea can be recognized again on the square as desired by the bosses.
Kompany is also someone who has often shifted the limits that were supposedly stuck for him in his life. He likes to tell and proudly tell how he grew up in Brussels as the son of a Congolese refugee and, contrary to all probabilities, made it into professional football.
He will and must now question himself and develop as a chief coach in order to prove FC Bayern that he is also someone as a trainer who can overcome borders. He must show that he can make tactical adjustments in good time, which lead to significantly fewer goals and, above all, to success.
He will get the next chance next season. But the truth also includes: the pressure on him has now increased.