Olmo and Leipzig Down Bayern
August 13, 2023 Although Kane was registered for the match, he was not in the starting lineup, which is perhaps understandable given his late arrivals and subsequent medicals and contract signings which dragged well into the early morning.
Thomas Tuchel’s lineup would consist of only one summer transfer with Sven Ulreich in goal, Benjamin Pavard, Dayot Upamecano, Matthijs de Ligt and Alphonso Davies in defense, Konrad Laimer started next to Joshua Kimmich in midfield, with Serge Gnabry, Jamal Musiala and Leroy Sané playing just behind Mathys Tel in attack.
Three Things We Noticed
Key Mistakes
Leipzig through Dani Olmo put Bayern behind in just the third minute as the Spaniard managed to get on the end of a corner that was poorly defended by the Munich side.
The following period went reasonably well for Bayern with several chances to score that were completely wasted. Olmo on the other hand took the ball in from Timo Werner and spun around de Ligt while somehow managing to keep his balance and easily slotted it past Ulreich in the 44th minute to give the visitors a 0-2 lead at the half.
Finally Olmo would convert from the spot after Noussair Mazraoui needlessly raised his hand in the box and gave away a penalty to complete his hat trick.
This match very much felt like a continuation of last season. To be fair, Bayern were somewhat unlucky on every one of the goals, but they can have no real complaints either as they could have done better on all of them as well.
Wasted Chances
They also had no room for complaint when they squandered so many chances to score. The Bavarians dominated serval runs of play in both halves but their finishing let them down time and again.
Gnabry, Musiala, Tel, Sané, Coman all had good opportunities to score in this match. All of them missed. Usually badly. This more than anything made the match feel like a continuation of the previous season.
A few defensive miscues that were capitalized on by the opposition while Bayern continuously squandered every chance that came their way with terrible finishing.
Debuts
Outside of Guerreiro, all of Bayern’s newcomers made their debut’s today. Laimer obviously started and Kim Min-Jae came on to start the second half for de Ligt. But there is no question the entire day was all about Kane.
I genuinely cannot remember a player that received quite as big a welcome a Kane did today. Everyone in attendance was eagerly awaiting a glimpse of the newest signing and they got it in the 64th minute as the Englishman replaced Tel up top.
Unfortunately, his teammates completely let him down and he had very little impact in the match at all. Olmo’s hat trick was completed just four minutes after his arrival which pretty much killed the game.
Laimer and Kim meanwhile had decent but unremarkable debuts, which given the scoreline is probably somewhat positive. Kim in particular made a crucial last second slide tackle to prevent another golden opportunity for Leipzig.
All in all, there is a lot of work left to do, but there is clearly a lot of hope and expectations that things will turn around quickly with the introduction of Kane up top. Tuchel will have his work cut out to get things on track in the next week for Werder Bremen on Friday.
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