By Walter Broeckx
We play Bayern Munich tonight in the CL. Anyone who follows football a bit knows that Bayern Munich is the biggest team in the Bundesliga. They are the most successful team in Germany. And also in Europe they have won lots of cups. And they sit on top of the Bundesliga with an unseen 15 points more than the team in second place.
They are a club with a lot of tradition and who have produced many world class players. The generation of Sepp Mayer, Franz Beckenbauer, Gerd Muller, Rummenige, …. Oh nostalgia, nostalgia for in those days in my country we could see the German TV stations I kind of grew up with the Bundesliga.
Bayern Munich has always been a team that had a lot of players coming through their own ranks and staying at the club for ever. And they added the best players from other teams in the Bundesliga. I think most players in the Bundesliga dream of playing for Bayern Munich at one stage in their career. Except the loyal Dortmund youth players maybe.
Bayern usually scores at least 2 goals in each game in the Bundesliga. And only on a rare occasion they let in goals. Only 7 so far in the Bundesliga. The good thing is that in the CL this season they have let in more goals. Even more goals than Arsenal in the group stages. So in the CL they are not that tight at the back as they usually are in the Bundesliga. Let us hope they stay that way in Europe.
If we look at Bayern in the CL I have seen that they have a little pattern the last seasons. Go rather far one year and the next season go out rather early. In 2009-2010 they reached the final and the season after that went out in the 1/8th finals. Last season they reached the final and so… well…one can hope they keep up this record.
Being the biggest club in Germany it is the most supported club but also the most hated club for supporters of other teams. They can be a bit arrogant in their behaviour. This goes for club, players and supporters. And certainly for the real Bavarian people it goes with a big pride for their region and the fact that Bayern Munich is the ideal advertising board of their region.
The player to watch closely for me is Muller. A 23 year old or young player from their own youth ranks. He is technically very gifted as are most German players but he can run, run, run and run up and down his flank without ever seemingly getting tired. And he scores a few goals also. I think he is their second best goal scorer. People who fear Ribery or Robben are slightly off centre I think. I know those two can have a great day but they also have more frustrating days than good days.
Their defence should be fine in normal circumstances but they have to shuffle it a bit. So they will play with Dante and Van Buyten in central defence. Both have a Belgian past. As Dante played in Belgium for a few years and Van Buyten is from Belgium be it with a German mother. Van Buyten is an old and experienced defender. He can score a few goals with a header at times but he is also prone to the odd mistake and error.
So we have to hope he is in one of those days famous and feared by the entire Belgium nation… whenever he plays for the Belgium national team!
He really can mess things up at times at the back. I have seen him make school boy errors in international games. But he can also score a goal and that is the reason he got picked so many times to play for Belgium. He also usually struggles against small players who are quick and can turn quick. So that might be a possible weakness in his game. And did I tell you he once was half a season at Manchester City some 8-9 years ago? He only played a handful of games also because of injury when he was loaned there from Marseille his club at the time.
Their keeper has a finger injury it seems so I hope Podolski gets his big gun out there and fires a few cannonballs at the keeper and maybe he can beat him a few times.
Up front apart from Muller who can also play in midfield we will probably see Mandzukic. The Croatian striker who came from Wolfsburg and who made a lot of goals and who is their top scorer this season. But the best scorer in the team is still Gomez. But this season Gomez has seemingly lost his scoring form and his place. But they have a lot of quality upfront.
So one could say they are quite a good team.
No big ref preview from me this time. I have heard that the ref will be Moen from Norway. We had him twice in the CL and won both games. He has done Bayern once and they won their game. All home games in fact. So this will be the first away game with Moen for Bayern. For Arsenal it will be the 3rd home game under Moen. And up to now he was great in both those games. His first visit he got a score of 90% in the old referee review format and the lost points was his assistant missing an offside. We had him also in the group stage this season when we beat Olympiacos with 3-1. So we can hope we keep it up with this ref, who until now has no negative history with Arsenal.
So we should have two teams, a good ref, on paper this should be a good game. If both teams want to go for it, it could be an entertaining evening. Bayern Munich is not a defensive orientated team so they will try to go forward. Given their league position and European status they are the favourites. But we know the favourites don’t always win.
Oh and if you go to the Emirates please do join in from the start when they start shouting REDARMY!!! I wanna hear you tonight!
Recent posts
- Did Stewart Robson con the BBC or were they in collusion over his rant today?
- Just like against Milan, just like against Barcelona.
- How Tottenham and Arsenal have both tried to save football from itself
- If you can’t take the ups and downs don’t bother with Arsenal
The books…
- Woolwich Arsenal: The club that changed football – Arsenal’s early years
- Making the Arsenal – how the modern Arsenal was born in 1910
- The Crowd at Woolwich Arsenal FC: crowd behaviour at the early matches
The sites…
- Referee Decisions - just what are the refs up to this season?
- Parent News - what is going on in schools these days?
- The weight loss programme: The only guaranteed way to stay fit
- The Arsenal History Blog from the AISA Arsenal History Society
uk
Hope was your word, not mine. What I actually said was, “This (buying older players) is actually what gives me confidence that the club are becoming more comfortable with spending since they can’t really hope to get much resale value from these players. ”
It was nothing to do with hope, or with project youth. It was to do with increase in spending, and willingness to absorb the cost of players not yielding money through resale. And still you say you don’t twist words?
@nihirealist
Oh pardon me for using the word hope instead of confidence. And for associating d search for resale value to the age of a player. It wud seem that you insinuate that the focus on younger players was driven by the need for resale value, would that be correct? Or is that another word-twister?
uk
It is. It doesn’t mean buying younger players was driven by that consideration. It means that the scope of selling the player for some decent amount of money exists if they are younger, and is diminished when they’re older. A safety net of sorts. Which the club seemingly are comfortable operating without.
How is the youth project a failure?
We have only been doing it for about 15 years so were hardly likely to have an abundance of talent available for the first team. I read it quoted somewhere that Ajax took 20 years to start seeing this come through and in a period where they didn’t build a new giant stadium
Wengerrr out, gazidiz out, kronke out, anyone the media hate out, all arsenal playerrs out…..
Well when bayern fans make more noise than arsenal fans in our own stadium, Fans out
when we concede a goal, the fans sit putting their hands on their cheeks watching with no commetment shown, fans out
instead of saying wenger cant motivate the team, start doing yr own job, u shall motivate the team, but no you cant make a noise except when booooing it own players, shame on you
Uk and A. Steward have won this round, for the first in the history of this blog (as well as Arsenal fc blog) someone has won an argument against Nihirrealist A.K.A Shard. Boy I enjoyed this debate, you guys are all very clever but Shard is still the best. By the way what does AAA stand for?I know Im stupid for not knowing what AAA means, its not my fault that Im a product of Bantu Education in an apartheid South Africa.
AAA – Anti Arsenal Arsenal
http://blog.emiratesstadium.info/the-aaa
@tony
Theres another name u can call us that’s trending now (sorry ur AAA never seemed to catch on outside of UA), its ABW -”anyone but wenger”. Developed from our response to the popular AKB question, “if we sack wenger, who wud u replace him with?”