Mission Lis6on Complete!
August 24, 2020 This match was a microcosm of this season. The opening 30 minutes were not the best. PSG probably had more chances. They arguably had the better chances. But Bayern held firm. They played their game. They held true to themselves and ultimately they finished off an increadible season in style by winning another historic treble!
Kingsley Coman Comes Through
Rightfully so, the focus in recent times has been on Sané and Gnabry. They are the players we all expect to be starting on the wings in the coming season. Kingsley Coman has been criticised. He has been injured so often that we all feel a little bad for him. But he has never wavered. He has consistently committed himself to the club. He has fought his way back from injury countless times. And when it came down to it, he was the one who scored the winning goal in a Champions League Final!
However, it wasn’t just the goal. Coman was arguably the most dangerous player on the pitch for Bayern. Almost every dangerous attack came through his wing. He gave Kehrer all he could handle and more. It was a wonderful performance in a huge moment. While there’s no doubt that Sane will be the first choice next season, Coman made himself a Bayern legend tonight and he deserves no end of credit for his play.
Kimmich the Swiss Army Knife
The other player involved in the goal also deserves a shoutout. Kimmich was once again fantastic in this match. He once again showed up when it mattered. Many were concerned about his defensive abilities against the attack of PSG, and not without reason. However, he once again showed that he is willing to do whatever it takes to help his team win. Moreover, he again showed that he not only desires to play in big games at the highest level but that he thrives in them. He seemed to be everywhere. Every time that Mbappe made a break, Kimmich was there.
Then when it really mattered, it was the midfielder, turned center back, turned right back, turned midfielder, turned right back that played in a perfect pass to Coman who made no mistake. It was a perfect cross in the perfect position, using Lewandowski as a decoy for the oncoming Frenchman. The young German is almost a surety to one day captain both club and country and has already nearly cemented himself as another legend of this historic club.
The Old Guard
It would be sacrilege to not mention the veterans. So many of the older generation has been doubted and scorned in recent years. They have been told they weren’t good enough. That they were past their prime. Tonight, and throughout this season, they showed everyone that all of those accusations and doubts were wrong. Neuer has been fantastic. Müller has looked like the player we all knew he was 4 years ago. Alaba became the corner stone of our defense. Boateng was the rock next to Alaba. And Lewandowski. Lewandowski had a career year…at the age of 31!
This is what Hansi Flick did so well when he took over. He merged the young and the old. He brought this team together and earned the respect of the players. He created an atmosphere where they wanted to play for and with each other. Where they were excited about coming to work every day. He reinstituted the style of play that suits the players that Bayern have. They responded accordingly, working hard on the press. Retaining possession. And most importantly attacking incisively!
Mission Complete
As I’ve already mentioned. It was a long season with so many ups and downs. If you told anyone that Bayern would win the Treble back in October, they would have thought you were insane. However, this team was resilient and a change in manager was all that was needed to bring them together. This is a historic win in unprecedented times. While some may detract from this achievement because of the format, it is also easy to argue that it shows just as much, if not more, grit to win in such an odd and unpredictable season. So my advice: Ignore the haters. Enjoy this win! We will always be able to look back on this moment with pride and joy! Bayern are Champions of Europe again! They are treble winners again! It’s time to celebrate!!!!
What a year! The treble. You never know in this game. Unbelievable!
I still can’t believe it either. What a night in Lisbon. Thanks for your comment.
It was a really a magical year! Thank you so much for your continued support!
KIINGS OF EUROPE!!
So proud of this squads achievements!
You’re right. We can be so proud of every single one player on this squad. Just great to see them perform together on and off the pitch. Thanks for your comment.
It’s a great feeling! Like you I am so happy for the players and everyone involved. They all genuinely deserved it!
I’m so happy!!! What a final. One of the best final I have ever seen in my life, and that includes a lot of ones from Champions League, Cups, World Cup, Euros, you name it, from 1999. I have to say, kudos to Thomas Tuchel and his team for giving a great performance, but I as said in one of my previous comment, this year Bayern don’t just have footballing ability at the highest level or mentality, we also finally have a little bit of luck that is needed with every champions. It was so good seeing the team contesting this strong PSG team, helping each other, and never look back. My eyes were in tears seeing Lewandowski after the game. He deserves it, as well as all others.
Thank you Hansi Flick for bringing the incredible end to the season, without him I’m sure we would not have today.
Thank you Miasanrot for your high quality content throughout the season. You are the FC Bayern of football blog world. Please don’t forget us the English speaking community, sometimes I’m jealous with the German part of the site :p
Yeahhhhh!!!
Thanks for your comment. We feel very flattered. And yes, we are not going to forget our EN community, but instead will try and increase our original content as we have been in the past few weeks. Feel free to let us know, if you have any ideas for articles or regular content. We are always open to outside opinion.
But for now, let’s celebrate this together. Treble 2020!
It was definitely a very well played final. It was nice to see two sides try to score instead of 1 or 2 sides trying not to concede. PSG had a good game plan. They had opportunities and could have hurt Bayern on a different night. But l agree with your assessment and might go a little further to say that “it felt like Bayern were destined to win the treble this season”. Every thing kind of came together for them and at the exact right time.
I also felt emotional for multiple players. It was so great to see so many of them win this for so many reasons. To potentially send out Javi, Thiago and Sven with a triple, not to mention others who may move on like Boateng or Alaba. Despite it not being the most successful of loans, I was genuinely happy for Coutinho as well. He is a very good player that just needs to find the right team. I’m glad he could get a little glory before his departure. After the year Lewandowski had, he deserved to cap it off with the team achievement he had been waiting for. The one he came to Bayern for in the first place. To validate that decision. For Muller, Neuer, Boateng and Alaba vindicating their places and then some. Winning another triple. Another Champions League. They will forever be legends, not that it was in doubt before, but this just sets them that much further apart. For Kimmich, Gnabry and Goretzka who provide so much life and energy to the club. Their work ethics are unreal. Not to mention the adjustments that Kimmich and Goretzka have made to their games for the benefit of the club. Then the genuine elation you can see on each of their faces every time Bayern win. Every time they get a trophy. We as fans always want to believe the players care the way that we do. With these players (and the vast majority of this team) it feels like they do. And Coman. He has had such a hard time. He will have a difficult time next season. But to see him score the biggest goal in the biggest moment possible is such a joy. He has so much talent and has worked so hard to return from so many injuries. He deserved a bit of luck. He deserved to have a big moment. And they don’t get any bigger than that.
Finally. Thank you Hien for you continued support and interaction. We genuinely appreciate it and are very grateful to have you as part of our little community. We will continue to do our best to provide you with quality content and, as Maurice indicated, we will be looking to bring you even more in the coming year.
[…] Mission Lis6on Complete! | […]
I think PSG did well with their pressing, considering the circumstances (e.g Bayern’s quality, PSG front 3’s teamwork & work rate), especially in the 1st half, and partly in the 2nd half too, though they were tired and sat deeper. A few people complained about Bayern’s offensive performance in the final, the same can be found for PSG, but these people do not understand it was because of the tactical impact the 2 teams caused to each other, they cancelled each other quite well, that’s why I found the final fascinating.
Hindsight is 20/20, but like the injury to Kroos in the quarter final of 2013, Robben became first choice on the right with Muller moving to the middle, and Jupp’s Bayern never looked back, a similar event happened this time, I think the unfortunate injury to Pavard actually helped Bayern a bit, since Kimmich helped a lot our progressive game, and it was evident again in the final. Despite being marked by Mbappe, his positioning was good, though risky, and flexible, moving up to connect with Gnarbry, moving inside with Gnarbry drop down, he helped to free Davies on the left occasionally, though PSG was good at managing our left side. Also Kimmich’s adventures positioning pinned both Bernat (he could not go to far to support PSG’s offensive), and especially Mbappe, I think Mbappe had to stay 10-15 metres deeper that he would like to, and that limited a lot his dangerous run to left channel. I didn’t even need to mention his wonderful assist for the only goal. On defensive side he did better than the semi-final, and with good organization from Flick, we managed to stiff Neymar and Mbappe well, except for a few occasions, of course no one can complete keep these players at bay for 90 minutes.
Now the excitement has cooled off a bit, I have a bad habit of looking forward to the next thing a bit too early :-) and my wish-list for moon festival (in my culture moon festival is mid-August, lunar calendar which is equivalent to mid September Gregorian calendar) is an overview and prediction of the next season in term of tactical evolution of Flick’s system. As good as we were last season, I have a few concerns for 2020-2021:
The durability and sustainability of the pressing game. 3 points:
– Un-matched team spirit, and, as some players said, a feeling of invincibility. Boateng said Flick gave one of the most memorable pre-match speech before the final. Will all of these work again, when we already reached the top?
– Next season will also be extremely packed, and a scenario of all players being available for a semi-final or final match will be much less likely. Key players like Neuer, Boateng, Muller, Lewy will be 1 year older. Can we sustain the intensity?
– Rudi Garcia and Thomad Tuchel showed some blueprints of limiting our game, of course their squad are also with immense quality, but this season Flick doesn’t have the surprise card anymore, how will he evolved his tactic?
The loss of technical quality in the centre axis: again 3 positions:
– Boateng: Sule will be likely to be integrated back to the XI next season, we all know he is much inferior to Boateng, when it comes to passing game, and how much Boateng helped in this aspect. Especially Kimmich will no longer be next to him in defense.
– The elephant in the room: Thiago. I won’t mention his crucial role in our play again, it hurts thinking about that and him leaving. Kimmich and Goretzka seem to complement each other better, but especially Goretzka still have a long way to go to develop his game with the ball. In the best scenario, Kimmich can replace Thiago on the technical and controlling side, but the who will be the “Kimmich” to replace himself? Remember Thiago and Kimmich combined to create a spectacular goal in the final, one of the few occasions we managed to break PSG defense.
– Coutinho: okay, I’m not saying the world ends with him leaving, but having such a technical gifted player on the bench to inject whenever you need more control is very nice. Now who will play that joker role?
Integration of more player and enlarging the core group. With the excuse of intense race and mid-season change, Flick relied a lot on a core 9-10 players, hardly giving substitutes proper chance, yet still maintain an unity rarely seen. I don’t think it will work nearly as good next season, players like Lucas Hernandes, Tolisso, Sule or even Cuissance will accept playing 10 minutes every 3 matches again. So yeah here we go:
– Find a place for Hernandez. For a team of astute financial management like Bayern, it’s hard to believe they struggle to find a starting place for the record signing. But it happened. I’m not blaming them since we all know why, but how do we deal with it now when everything starts from zero again?
– Integrate Sane and Sule to the XI. Easier said than done even if they are great players.
– More chance for fringe players a.k.a Tolisso, Cuissance, Zirkzee etc. I would assume Cuissance will play the Coutinho role, while Fein will play the Cuissance role this season, but quite a risk in term of personnel I would say.
– Nubel?
Can’t wait to read what you think :-)