FC Bayern Munich, their talent and the small squad: the biggest little step

FC Bayern Munich dismantled FC Schalke 04 at the start of the Bundesliga 8-0 (here are the featured videos), but at the same time there is disagreement in the club about the size of the team. While coach Hansi Flick wants newcomers, board member Oliver Kahn touched on the talents available.

As is well known, the corona pandemic changed almost everything in football, including work as a journalist, of course. If you used to meet the protagonists in person at press conferences, now you only meet them virtually through an online video conference. And when the internet is involved, it tends to fail.

At the press conference leading up to the first Bundesliga game against FC Schalke 04, Flick had already talked for a few minutes about the insufficient squad size when a journalist responded by raising his hand. She was kicked out of the online video conference due to internet problems, she said apologetically, so I don’t know if her question has already been asked. But what about team size and load management?

Because Flick is, on the one hand, a courteous guy and, on the other hand, his message seems important to him, he just repeated it. “I already said it, but now again for you,” Flick announced: “It is important that you have a good squad. We are working to make sure we have several options.”

Hansi Flick request to Hasan Salihamidzic

Bayern won the game against Schalke the next day 8-0, but that did not change their opinion. Flick thinks the current team is too small, he wants newcomers. “He’s getting very close to the players right now,” Flick said, telling sporting director Hasan Salihamidzic: “I’m in a good mood because Hasan can improve the quality of the team.” He still has two weeks left, the transfer phase ends on October 5.

Given the departure of Thiago and the cessions of Ivan Perisic, Philippe Coutinho and Alvaro Odriozola and the imminent departure of Javi Martínez on the one hand and the commitment of Leroy Sane on the other, FC Bayern has only 14 field players who are at higher level and thus more than four less than last season.

With Joshua Kimmich, David Alaba, Benjamin Pavard and a few others, Flick has flexible players available. But if there are too many injuries, bans, or quarantines, that doesn’t help at some point. Against Schalke, for example, David Alaba and Kingsley Coman were absent, while Alphonso Davies sat outside. The only experienced and ready outfield player on the bench was Corentin Tolisso.

Oliver Kahn: “Don’t always talk about new signings”

“Of course we think so. We will calmly make more considerations, we are in constant contact with Hansi Flick,” board member Oliver Kahn said after the victory against Schalke. Regardless, the 19-year-old right-back Sergino Dest from Ajax Amsterdam is expected to come, and a winger and midfielder are actually still needed. But Kahn thinks, “You don’t always have to talk about new signings right away, but look what we have up our sleeve.”

While Flick wants to strengthen the team with outside players, Kahn relies on his own talents to play bigger roles on the team. In fact, FC Bayern currently has more promising talents than it has in a long time. At the final whistle against Schalke, four of them were on the pitch: Chris Richards (20), Michael Cuisance (21), Joshua Zirkzee (19) and Jamal Musiala (17).

Jamal Musiala made history against Schalke

The latter even made history without further ado: After a short solo career, he scored the 8-0 goal and, at the age of 17 years and 205 days, became Bayern’s youngest competitive scorer of all time. . “He’s often shown in practice what he did today,” said Flick. “He is an excellent soccer player. We will try to guide him carefully so that he can improve and help us even more.”

In addition to the talents already substituted against Schalke, Bright Akwo Arrey-Mbi (17, central defender), who arrived from Chelsea with Musiala in the summer of 2019, newcomer Tanguy Nianzou (18, central defender, currently ill) from Paris Saint-Germain and Adrian Fein (21, midfield), who returned from Hamburger SV in the summer after a successful loan. “Now we hope that he will take the next big step with us,” Salihamidzic recently said of Fein.

The passage of talents to the professional team of FC Bayern has never been as great in terms of quality as now. As a triple winner, they are ultimately the best team on the continent. Unless there are many new players, the step, be it the small team, the many competitive games in a very short time, the extremely exhausting play style and the five change options in reality, is at the same time as small as what It has long been.

For talents, this biggest little step of all time is a good prospect, for Flick it’s a risk.

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