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FC Bayern destroyed the divided league

The longest season in Bundesliga history is over, time to take stock. FC Bayern breaks a lot, except itself. Borussia Dortmund helps with the step to world class. In addition, there are learning processes about racism and a scorer who emulates Gerd Müller.

For a short time the Bundesliga could hope that after seven years something other than “FC Bayern Munich” could finally be engraved on the championship trophy. Then Hansi Flick came. He took over from Niko Kovac after the tenth matchday as head coach and simply prohibited his team from ending football games without a win. After two 1: 2 bankruptcies against Leverkusen (matchday 13) and in Mönchengladbach (matchday 14) shortly after Flick took office, it worked out with the consequent implementation. Including the 4-0 win at VfL Wolfsburg, Bayern have since won 19 out of 20 games and scored 58 out of 60 possible points. The record champion dominated, the rest of the league stretched in vain and in the end has to acknowledge again: If the Munich team does not go wrong over long distances, the title always goes to Bayern.

After the failed start and therefore growing displeasure, Flick agreed the team, has long been considered a player whisperer. The small squad made it possible for almost all professionals to play, Thomas Müller woke up from his Kovac sleep, and there was no unrest between the coach and the team. Manuel Neuer got upset, but more about sports director Hasan Salihamidzic, who hired his supposed successor Alexander Nübel. Neuer made his claim to number one clear, Flick agreed. Leon Goretzka took the next step to become the leading player, Joshua Kimmich has long since filled this role, not only because of his groundbreaking dream goal in the top game at Borussia Dortmund. This constant dominance of FC Bayern means that more Bundesliga championship cups are now stored on Säbener Straße than in the rest of the republic. In 57 years since the elite class was founded, FCB was number one at the end of the season 29 times, all other clubs 28 times.

Winning the Bundesliga has long been more of a duty than a real challenge for Bayern. Munich is not only sporty, but financially too hasty. This is mainly due to the Champions League, in which the same increasingly rich clubs have been playing the title among themselves for years – and sharing the income between themselves. Where this development leads is not only shown by Bayern’s dominance in the Bundesliga. In Italy Juventus is on the way to the ninth title in a row, in France the champions have been named Paris Saint-Germain in seven of the past eight years, in Spain Real Madrid and FC Barcelona share the honor. FC Bayern’s biggest competitor in Germany is its own negligence, as the last matchday showed. While the Munich team in Wolfsburg dominated a game that was meaningless to them, the supposedly toughest chaser Dortmund refused any performance in the 0: 4 against Hoffenheim, it could have been twice as high.

BVB is still the best springboard for young stars

Even if the Dortmund team had to let Bayern go first in the championship fight, they should have been happy about the season. The reason for this are three young stars: Jadon Sancho, Achraf Hakimi and Erling Haaland. With 34 scorer points, Sancho is the third best in the league in this category, Hakimi, loaned by Real Madrid, ran pretty much all out on the outside in the Bundesliga as well as in the Champions League – and Erling Haaland came, met and increased his market value again immeasurably . After the young top players Mario Götze and Robert Lewandowski started at BVB and moved to FC Bayern, then the Pierre-Emerick Aubameyangs, Ousmane Dembélés and Christian Pulisics migrated to foreign top clubs, the next youngster squad at BVB made this in the 2019/20 season important next step on the way to world class.

Even if Hakimi probably goes back to Real Madrid and finally to Inter Milan and Sancho maybe switches to the Premier League for an absurd sum of millions: The signal that BVB sends to top talents worldwide is loud and clear: With us you can make the breakthrough create, come to us rather than earn more at Manchester City, but acidify on the bench.

BVB is said to have already won the fight for the next great talent from England, Jude Bellingham’s change is said to be almost perfect. And then there’s Haaland. The 19-year-old preferred the black and yellow to other top clubs, has scored 13 goals in 14 Bundesliga games since the winter break – and, according to his own statement, will remain a bit intact for BVB. After all, the Norwegian already has a contract until 2024, but the next young star will also replace him at some point. For example Giovanni Reyna, the 17-year-old is already an integral part of the squad.

The Bundesliga is learning to deal with racism

When Weston McKennie, Jadon Sancho and Achraf Hakimi demonstrated on the lawn against the murder of George Floyd by white police officers and against racism, the DFB initially fell back into classic patterns: the offense, messages on the underwear are not allowed, is checked and it is is advised about a penalty. After all, the association has also learned and refrains from punishing – even if it would have been a far stronger sign to directly approve of the campaign for more humanity. Luckily, the worldwide protests against racism do not stop at the Bundesliga either, many professionals take part in anti-racism campaigns on social media or speak out against all kinds of discrimination on camera. This was by no means always the case. But it has to stay that way forever and not just be a trendy “join in”.

The fact that there is still a lot to do in the fight against racism in the Bundesliga is again evident in the 2019/20 season: Hertha’s Jordan Torunarigha is racially insulted by Schalke fans in the DFB Cup, there is not a single conviction and lack of evidence the response for the defense lawyer is not nearly as great as that Hoffenheim patron Dietmar Hopp experiences when he is insulted with abusive posters. Even Schalke boss Clemens Tönnies can continue despite racist statements as if nothing had happened – he too gets a lot of support from the Bundesliga greats. So there is hope that the gruesome murder of Floyd and the subsequent global mass protests will make football in Germany more aware of structural and direct racism and condemned it more clearly than before. Responsible professionals have to prove that they face discrimination not only on the Internet, but also on the pitch and in society.

Robert Lewandowski is the best scorer since Gerd Müller

Robert Lewandowski to Gerd Müller is only four minutes away. Since the Polish striker switched to the Bundesliga in summer 2010, he has been playing on average every 109 minutes. Only the top scorer Gerd Müller has been better in the history of the highest German football league since its introduction in 1963. It hit every 105 minutes between 1965 and 1979. The next player in the rankings of the most effective attackers who has a comparable number of games as Lewandowski (321) and Müller (427) is Mario Gomez – who, however, took half an hour longer to score. It is not the only statistic in which Lewandowski follows in the footsteps of the “bomber of the nation”: Müller was top scorer seven times, Lewandowski five times, none other than three times. In the season just ended Lewandowski scored 34 times, only Müller was better, who scored 40, once 38 and once 36 goals.

Lewandowski has been competing with his ex-club, Borussia Dortmund, since the winter. Erling Haaland scored 13 times in just 15 appearances. Converted to minutes of play per goal, the Norwegian was just as effective as Lewandowski, both standing 81 minutes for each of their goals. The 19-year-old sometimes looks like an adolescent who cannot yet fully tame his own strength. The body at Haaland keeps pinching, which means that it always needs breaks and didn’t even play half of its games over the full distance. Lewandowski, on the other hand, was on the pitch for 90 minutes in 29 of 31 cases.

In the shadow of these two exceptional professionals, Timo Werner also moved in historical dimensions. The Noch-Leipziger and Bald-Londoner scored 28 times, a German striker last scored more goals in 1981: At that time it was Karl-Heinz Rummenigge who put on the top scorer with 29 goals. The fact that Chelsea are ready to make Werner the most expensive German football professional sounds like the logical consequence. Although this title could go to Kai Havertz in a few weeks, the prospect of another year of the Europa League in Leverkusen should not be too euphoric. Which was not due to Havertz, who did everything in the second half of the season with ten goals and five assists to lead his team back to the Champions League. Chelsea are said to be interested in him, among other big names.

The division of the Bundesliga is progressing

A look at the final table reveals that the Bundesliga is a multi-class society. At the top, FC Bayern turns its circles lonely, deciding whether to win the championship or not. This is followed by Borussia Dortmund, who would like to be a serious challenger, but not only fails because of the superiority of the industry leader, but also because of their own mentality problems. Rasenballsport Leipzig is also going to become number two thanks to what it says is a “completely usual” haircut of EUR 100 million by financiers Red Bull. In the first year under coach Julian Nagelsmann there was simply no home victory – Leipzig played more draws in their own arena (eight times) than it won (seven times).

“We weakened in between, so the competitors missed a bit to pull away. And when Hansi took the helm, he got the ship going again very quickly.” Bayern Munich CEO Karl-Heinz Rummenigge on the TV channel “Sky” after the 1-0 win at Werder Bremen and the eighth championship title in a row via trainer Hansi Flick.

This is followed by Borussia Mönchengladbach and Bayer Leverkusen, who commute between the Champions League and Europa League and are thus clearly above the rest of the league, but cannot challenge the big three in the long run. Because the gap between the two competitions is huge, Gladbach, as fourth, can expect at least 20 million euros in additional income compared to the fifth Leverkusen.

This means that five of the six European cup places have been safely allocated. (Unless two already qualified teams move into the cup final like this year) TSG Hoffenheim, VfL Wolfsburg and Eintracht Frankfurt are currently arguing for the only remaining place that leads to international football after FC Schalke up to More in the sporting insignificance – which is probably the least problem of the club – has passed. Small surprises like SC Freiburg in this year or Werder Bremen except last year are followed by the (expanded) relegation battle.

David Needy and Torben Siemer

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