Doubts are growing about coach Kompany’s method

Some laws are unwritten. But that doesn’t mean that they can’t have an impact; some of them are even more powerful because their logic is immediately obvious to everyone. At FC Bayern, one of these unwritten rules is: “Losing a game is a drama. Losing two games is a scandal. In three games the coach goes over the Wupper.”

At least that’s what Bavaria’s former CEO Karl-Heinz Rummenigge once explained in an interview with the NZZ, and it can be said that these principles have lost none of their relevance. The air is thin in Munich right now, which is why some experts are thinking about the future of young coach Vincent Kompany.

The reason for discussion is given: the Munich team lost 1:4 in the Champions League at FC Barcelona on Wednesday – against the team of former Bayern coach Hansi Flick, who also enraptures the Spanish metropolis with his stone-cold manner.

Only one win from the last five games

A defeat with a three-goal difference: that is more than remarkable for Munich standards. And the sheer result becomes more important when you consider how the last few weeks have gone: FC Bayern were only able to win one of five games, last weekend against Stuttgart, a top game after all. But against two other top teams in the Bundesliga, against Frankfurt and the champions Leverkusen, it was only enough for a draw. Add to that the defeat in the Champions League at Aston Villa: there should actually be a doom and gloom atmosphere in Munich.

This is not yet the case. And that has to do with the way coach Kompany has performed so far. After a game he said a remarkable sentence: “We have to learn.” Constant improvement, working on details: that is the signature of the Belgian, who was the executive arm of coach Josep Guardiola at Manchester City for many years.

Only: Kompany has already spent a little over three months with the Bayern team. The processes he has initiated should actually start to take effect. Like in those games in which Bayern brought an enthusiastic audience out of their seats: in the 9:2 against Dinamo Zagreb or recently in the 4:0 against Stuttgart. So it works occasionally, but not permanently.

It’s a special situation after all. And perhaps it is comparable to the one in 2009, when Bayern hired coach Louis van Gaal with the clear slogan that he should seriously change the culture of the game. The Munich team started well back then too, but then they got out of step and the future of the coach was already being discussed. Then the full-back Philipp Lahm gave a remarkable interview – and in it he supported the coach’s course towards the club management.

Today there is a veteran on whose broad shoulders Kompany can lean: Thomas Müller. Against Frankfurt, when the score was 3-3, he didn’t want to make fun of the late equalizer. Instead, he talked about what a pleasure it was to “constrict” the opponent in their own half. Method over result: This hasn’t happened for FC Bayern for a long time.

Now FC Barcelona is not Eintracht Frankfurt, even though the Hessians have an exceptionally talented striker like Omar Marmoush. Nevertheless, the Munich collapse in Barcelona may have led some people to be skeptical about Kompany’s risky method, who justified his penchant for almost unconditional offensiveness by saying that it was in keeping with his character.

The problems are not really new. Bayern attack the opponent early, they move up wide to do so, it is an intense game and requires maximum attention at every moment. Because if the opponent wins the ball, rapid counterattacks are guaranteed. This is exactly what Barcelona managed to do, like all the other teams that Bayern struggled against. And it became clear once again that the central defender duo of Kim Min-jae and Dayot Upamecano are insecure when the pressure is high.

Such a problem would be smaller if Bayern had a goalie who instilled confidence in those in front of them. That’s exactly what Manuel Neuer was for more than a decade. But anyone who sees the goalkeeper, who shone at the European Championships in the summer, today has to ask themselves how long Bayern want to plan with a new player in this condition.

Even if you can’t blame him for any big mistakes, there are balls that he would have parried in better times. In addition, in some situations he shows an arrogance that is no longer appropriate for his reputation. In Barcelona he also misused the ball in the penalty area against Lamine Yamal. It was pure luck that there was no goal conceded.

Eberl had decided against Flick

In any case, the mood at Bayern is gloomy. Joshua Kimmich judged harshly: “What we did is partly hara-kiri.” Meanwhile, sports director Max Eberl, who discovered coach Kompany for the Bundesliga, tried to defuse the situation – and used his tone incorrectly. When a journalist explained to him in which moments the defense had acted inadequately, he recommended that he get “a coaching license” so that the man could show that he can do better.

Calmness in such a situation, supported by the conviction that you have made the right decision when looking for a coach, certainly sounds different. Quite a few recalled on Wednesday evening that Max Eberl had decided against Hansi Flick, who would probably have had no objection to a reasonable offer from Munich.

Thomas Müller’s statement also seems interesting – because at 35 years old, the attacker is something like the seismograph of this club. Little remains of the enjoyment that Müller still felt against Frankfurt. Rather, he explained after the defeat that there was still a lot of work ahead of the Munich team. At that moment he sounded almost like his trainer.