Despite blips in the form of losses to both Aston Villa and Barcelona in the Champions League, Bayern Munich have yet to have lost a match in the Bundesliga or DFB-Pokal under new manager Vincent Kompany. Heading into the international break, they sit at the top of the league table, five points clear of RB Leipzig in second place. They have scored 33 goals in the league so far and have only conceded seven, boasting the best attack and second best defense in the league, behind only Leipzig’s tally of five goals conceded.
Ever since the 4-1 defeat at Barcelona in the Champions League, there has really been a heightened sense of feel-good factor at Bayern. Kompany has led the Rekordmeister to five straight wins on the bounce and as many clean sheets ever since they were bested by former Bayern and Germany manager Hansi Flick in the Catalans. From the wins over VfL Bochum, Mainz, Union Berlin, SL Benfica and St. Pauli, Bayern scored 14 goals and conceded 0, going into the international break in their best patch of form in the season.
Even in the matches Bayern drew to Bayer Leverkusen (1-1) and Eintracht Frankfurt (3-3), there is certainly an argument to be made that they could have, and perhaps even should have, won both of those matches and did not play terribly by any stretch of the imagination. Some would even argue that same sentiment applies to the 1-0 loss to Villa, but the Barcelona loss is assuredly the outlier with that logic.
On the overall balance, Bayern president Herbert Hainer can sense that things are going right with Kompany at the helm, adding every bit of confidence going forward as they look to get rid of the bitter taste of not winning any silverware last season. “Our team is giving us great joy, Vincent Kompany is doing an excellent job. We have been playing exciting football since the start of the season, and we have now won all of our last five games without conceding a goal. This shows that Vincent is constantly developing our team,” Hainer explained in an interview with Tz (via @iMiaSanMia).
Photo by TOBIAS SCHWARZ/AFP via Getty Images
There can be no complaints with where Bayern is in their domestic competitions, and there is still plenty of time to turn their fortunes around in the Champions League, which they started in the form of their 1-0 win over Benfica at the Allianz Arena. “In the Bundesliga, we are top of the table after 10 matchdays, five points ahead of second place, in the Champions League we are on the right track after the 1-0 win against Benfica – and in the DFB-Pokal we are looking forward to the top match against Leverkusen in the Allianz Arena. We hope that things will continue like this after the international break,” Hainer enthused.
There will certainly be more difficult stretches for Bayern that will ask more questions of Kompany and how he can respond to potential mishaps, but they have left off on a high note before returning to action after this month’s international break.
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