This Wednesday evening, Thomas Tuchel and his team will take part in the competition again, in which the football coach and the football players of FC Bayern Munich are always a little more motivated than before. The Champions League is the most demanding competition in world football.
The best players play there, the best coaches train there. And perhaps Tuchel will discover another advantage since last weekend – that’s how he should see it: the Champions League is the competition that the German sports broadcaster Sky is not allowed to broadcast.
Because when Tuchel walks through the stadium and speaks into the microphones of the media with broadcast rights, he will – unlike in the Bundesliga – not have to argue with Lothar Matthäus and Dietmar Hamann, the experts at the television station with whom he will speak on Saturday evening in Dortmund face-to-face (Matthäus) and computer-to-computer (Hamann). And thus created a communicative highlight that competed for media attention with the playful highlight, his team’s outstanding 4-0 win.
On Tuesday afternoon, when he was sitting in the Arena in Munich for the Champions League press conference, Thomas Tuchel had been talking for several minutes about the game against Galatasaray Istanbul (9 p.m., in the FAZ live ticker for the Champions League and on DAZN), when it comes to the game against Borussia Dortmund again. More precisely: about “the surroundings,” as a reporter put it in his question. Tuchel has to grin. And when the reporter then wants to know whether he is preparing for such TV interviews, Tuchel says: “It’s spontaneous – and then remains authentic.” He was simply dissatisfied with the “specific reporting.” And then notes: “If you have taken the trouble to watch my other interviews, you will have seen that, as always, we have put the content in the middle.” And because from his point of view everything has been said, it is there On Tuesday the focus will again be on content.
No rehearsed speeches: Thomas Tuchel wants to remain authentic : Image: dpa
In his statements, Tuchel suggests, for example, why it is currently possible to diagnose a discrepancy between the stability of his offense (very stable) and his defense (not so stable). He recalls that he said in the summer that he actually didn’t want to change his starting line-up so that players could “establish themselves”. He was able to implement that on offense. The same players are usually allowed to start there: the wingers Kingsley Coman (right) and Leroy Sané (left), the playmaker Jamal Musiala and of course the center forward Harry Kane.
But he couldn’t do it defensively. Central defender Matthijs de Ligt sustained an injury there. Then the central defender Dayot Upamecano. Then de Ligt again. And because right-back Noussair Mazraoui was not always fit and was missing, midfielder Konrad Laimer had to step in as full-back, which in turn changed the composition of the defensive midfield. And then there is the new goalkeeper, whom the coach used for the first time in Munich.
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When Tuchel speaks on Tuesday, Manuel Neuer is already gone. He was sitting in front of it in the arena where he will play in the Champions League on Wednesday for the first time since his return. And he had news that doesn’t concern FC Bayern, but the national team. “We spoke openly about everything,” said about his conversation with national coach Julian Nagelsmann, with whom he had agreed that he “wouldn’t travel to the national team” next week, that I still needed the time for myself. This has “medical backgrounds”. But Neuer also indicated that the upcoming international matches will be the last ones he will miss: “We are happy that it will be the case next year.”
