Bayern Munich has moved a little closer to league leaders Bayer Leverkusen with a win in the catch-up game against Union Berlin. The record champions won 1-0 (0-0) on Wednesday evening (January 24th, 2024) and thus somewhat smoothed the waves that had recently hit the Munich team after their surprising defeat against Werder Bremen. However, there were fires at UnionCoach Nenad Bjelica make some backups.
With their success, Bayern reduced the gap to league leaders Leverkusen to four points, while Union, in 15th place, still has a three-point buffer to the relegation zone. Raphael Guerreiro achieved redemption from Bayern’s perspective and the only goal of the evening shortly after the break (46′).
“Of course we would have liked us to score a second goal so that things would be a little quieter at the back.”said Leon Goretzka to the sports show after the game, “But we didn’t let anything go backwards. That was a solid performance.” “It wasn’t a brilliant victory”added Bayern coach Thomas Tuchel, “The opponent defended too deep. Our precision with the shots and crosses wasn’t high enough to score a second goal.”
Tough first half for Munich
In the first half of the game, Bayern, with Goretzka rotated into the starting eleven while Alphonso Davies had to watch the start of the game from the bench, had an extremely difficult time against guests from Berlin-Köpenick who were completely defensive. The somewhat academic value of the “goals expected based on the course of the game and the chances of scoring” (Expected Goals) was 0.09 for guests.
Union “walled up” – and very successfully. The record champions only had two high-profile chances: a header from Matthijs de Ligt was saved by Berlin-Keeper Frederik Rönnow with a good reaction away (6th), the goalkeeper let an unpleasant touchdown from Leon Goretzka bounce away, but had the ball in the follow-up (45th + 4). At this point, Berlin’s Kevin Volland was no longer in the game after a collision with Dayot Upamecano. Upamecano apparently remained in the dressing room after the break with a muscle injury in his left thigh and was replaced by Eric Dier.
Quick impact after the change
Less than a minute had passed in the second half when Munich celebrated. A hit on the post by Harry Kane It ended up somewhat fortunately with Guerreiro, who placed the ball in the top right corner of the goal from ten meters with a remarkable shot from the outside of the instep with his left foot. A hit from Kane was rightly not recognized because of a (very thin) offside position by passer Leroy Sané. They got further goals in what was a generally weak game fans not to be seen in the Munich Arena.
Bjelica loses her nerve
The game had its ugly climax a quarter of an hour before the end of the game with a throw-in for Munich: Sané wanted to throw the ball in at the level of the Berlin dugout, but Union-Coach Nenad Bjelica didn’t move the ball out. When the Bayern player then tried to fish the ball out of the coach’s hand, he pushed Bjelica Sané pulled away from himself twice with his hand on his neck and face. Referee Frank Willenborg showed the coach, around whom a crowd of players and staff quickly formed, a red card for an act of violence. The Croatian will probably be missing from Berlin in some games.
“Sané pushed me and then I reacted how I shouldn’t react”said the Union coach after the game at the sports show, “They are emotions that you have to accept. I’m sorry for my club and my team. The red card is fine, a hand in the face is not acceptable.”
Christoph Nahr, sports show, January 24th, 2024 11:30 p.m
Bavaria in Augsburg, Union welcomes Darmstadt
The Munich team will play against FC Augsburg on matchday 19 (Saturday, January 27th, 2024 at 3:30 p.m.). One day later, Union Berlin will also host Darmstadt 98 at 3:30 p.m.
