AWhen the game was almost over, Kevin Trapp had to storm out of his gate again. In front of him he saw a player with a red jersey and a few meters behind him several Eintracht colleagues. But Trapp, the Frankfurt goalkeeper, could no longer hope for his defenders. Now only he was there. Something like that had happened twice before, and both times Trapp couldn’t do anything because the ball had rushed past him flat and fast. Now the player with the red jersey didn’t shoot the ball flat and fast, but lifted it halfway up and slowly into Trapp’s gloves. That is the difference between Robert Lewandowski and Leon Goretzka.
When the game was really over, Trapp had to deal with Lewandowski again after the 0: 5, the striker from Munich who “has extremely high quality”, as Trapp said in an interview. He soberly summed up how Lewandowski had outwitted him three times in the game. Twice in one-on-one, once in the fray of a corner kick. “He’s got a run for it,” said his coach, Hansi Flick, “he’s making a goal out of almost every chance at the moment.” But where was Lewandowski in the 86th minute when Goretzka failed with his lob?
Something extraordinary happened in the arena in Munich on Saturday afternoon. When Goretzka lifted up and Trapp grabbed it, Lewandowski was sitting in the stands with a winter jacket because he no longer wanted to take part. In the course of the game, as Flick revealed afterwards, Lewandowski announced that he would like to be replaced. “This is news that hasn’t been seen before,” said Flick, grinning. When Lewandowski had played 68 minutes and scored three goals, his coach replaced him. But why did he miss 22 minutes and maybe even more goals? “When you see how many games we have until the end of the year and how difficult the season is,” said Lewandowski, “you can’t just think about how many goals you score in the Bundesliga.”
Behind Leipzig
It’s amazing how Flick and his team sprinted through a Bundesliga game against Eintracht, which they also used to breathe and switch. This can be illustrated well using Lewandowski as an example. In his form, 68 minutes are enough for him to do everything. He has already scored ten goals in the first five league games. This has never happened in the history of the Bundesliga.
Now that Bayern are setting records again, it may be important to mention that they are not at the top of the table. That’s good news for the league. But there is also a less good one: Bayern are second behind Leipzig with 22: 8 goals, although they are still tinkering and testing at the moment. Flick used the home game against Frankfurt to take a closer look at his new players. He placed Bouna Sarr on the right defensive side. He was still a little unfamiliar with his tasks.
When playing with the ball, he preferred to fall back when in doubt. In the game against the ball he was always wrong. But he fulfilled his most important task automatically: He relieved the frequent player Benjamin Pavard. For the time being, there is no longer this possibility on the left side of defense. In the third minute, Alphonso Davies bent over, doubled over, patted the lawn with his hand. In the arms of two supervisors, he hobbled to the touchline and couldn’t put his right foot down. After the game, Flick clarified: A tape in Davies’ right foot was torn, another one was torn, and it would be out for six to eight weeks. As long as the form strong Lucas Hernández plays there. But who will relieve him in case of doubt? Here, according to Flick, you just have to get “a little creative”.
Flick’s trickiest job
It could be Flick’s trickiest task to manage the game minutes of his pros in this unusual season. On Saturday he was allowed to distribute some to Leroy Sané for the first time, who had been missing a capsule injury in his knee in the past few weeks. In the end it was only 22 minutes, but there were two amazing actions. The 4-0, a wonderful goal, made Sané with the old seal trick: pull from the right into the middle and shoot with your left foot into the far corner. The 5: 0 from Jamal Musiala, 17 years old and also one for the flank, initiated Sané with a run to the baseline.
And when it comes to external attackers: There is also news in the Serge Gnabry case. Last Tuesday, the national team tested positive for Covid-19. In Munich they are now assuming that the sample was false-positive. On Saturday, Flick reported that two PCR tests and one antigen test had been negative since then. Gnabry followed the game against Frankfurt from home quarantine. On Sunday, however, the club announced that Gnabry could travel to Moscow, where Bayern will play in the Champions League on Tuesday (6.55 p.m. in the FAZ live ticker for the Champions League and at DAZN). The Department of Health in Munich now also believes in a false-positive test.
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