Passive and harmless : Borussia Dortmund's questionable appearance at Bayern

The most exciting event of this exciting Munich weekend was to gaze at the Prince Regent street. At the southern end of the English garden, next to the American Consulate-General, and, of course, Niko Kovac was asked if he would look over yet. On a mineral water or something, there was something to celebrate.

Niko Kovac, grown up in Berlin's working class district of Wedding, and as a soccer player blessed with a manageable glamour factor, has not been able to laugh about it. "We play football," said the coach of Bayern Munich, "but it's only to trivialities, only sensations." In this specific case, not to the great game of Bayern, a 5:0 victory in the, well, top game of the Bundesliga against Borussia Dortmund. It is the most sustainable success in the now nine-months-long coaching career of Niko Kovac at Bayern. And was struggling in the public perception, have a hard time with Jerome Boateng were for the late Saturday evening continued the Party in the P1, the Club at the Prinzregentenstaße, Bayern in the nineties were made, as they used their reputation as FC Hollywood.

Jerome Boateng was one of the best interior defenders in the world. At the Munich Gala against Dortmund he played a minor role and the time distribution of 90 one-sided minutes on the substitutes ' bench. And yet the guest list for his Party in the Munich-based world of the major characters has been discussed more passionate than the lineup of FC Bayern. Niko Kovac gave the assembled Party-correspondents with on the way to P1, you would have noted hopefully, "we changed the tactics and with a six and two Aft have played". So, with Javi Martinez as a defensive figure in the Central midfield and the previously posted free Thomas Müller and Thiago Alcantara spirits. A feisty FC Bayern urged the BVB so brutal in the Defensive, that Niko Kovac was allowed to call the 5:0 unchallenged as "the amount deserved".

the game Was an appropriate response to public debate about its tactical abilities? Kovac tried to not even try at Pretending to be in a good mood. He was not a moralizer, "but it's not okay, what the fuck is going on." And: "If you win, you've done nothing right. If you lose, you did everything wrong. We coaches are the ones who get everything. We have to face. Whether the must be in the Form of always, I question.“ As Adjutant to his Central defender Mats Hummels said: "the way we played in the first 45 minutes, we are a Top team. The Passive is not as. It was also planned against Liverpool differently,“ the seemingly loose farewell from the Champions League wants. Once again Mats Hummels: "It was not so, that the coach has said at the time: We want to play passively."

Borussia Dortmund was only in theory, on the match report sheet by an opponent

Niko Kovac respect demanded for his players and, above all, for themselves. Suitable he formulated Kant's categorical to come on Saturday night in Munich on Sunday: "Everyone must have the claim: what I don't want me hurt, that I do not do to others." Kovac argued from the comfortable Position of the winner. As a coach of a team that had done everything right and yet the evidence of their size guilty had to stay. The opponent was too small. Borussia Dortmund was only in theory, on the match report sheet by an opponent. A single Time this team played with the Verve that had brought them to the table top. That was after five minutes, at your most beautiful and at the same time, single attack, according to Mahmoud Dahouds shot from the post off as, later, the whole of the Dortmund workforce in the aggressive spirit of the enemy.

"If we shoot a goal, maybe a different game," Dortmund coach Lucien Favre. May be. But as an explanation for the timid and unimaginative idea of his team's early pitch was not good due to the. Why defending BVB so deep, managed Thomas Delaney and Axel Witsel in the game with a listlessness, as it is said to have officials in bad jokes? Why the cheeky Dribbler Jadon Sancho ventured no Dribbling, held Roman Bürki not a single serious Ball? And where Marco Reus was actually?

the Dortmund game was the beginning of a fearful

Dortmund's captain had to hire in the absence of the injured Paco Alcacér on the front, which he described with a hard-to-restrained displeasure as "not exactly my favorite position". Reus was a prominent victim of the tactical conversion of his Coach. Lucien Favre wanted to receive the Bavaria with a minor Defensive, with the powerful Dahoud on the side of the strategists Delaney and Witsel. However, a defensive basic order requires aggressiveness in the Two warfare, the courage to take a quick foray into the gaps, offering a full-on attack set, the Munich team. Dortmund game was the beginning of a fearful, on the basis of a four-chain was not a chain. With a next to the Central defender Dan-Axel Zagadou and overwhelmed Lukasz Piszczek on the right side against Kingsley Coman only too clearly that he had been missing for two months due to injury.

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The tactician Favre was the unspoken accusation exposed that he had failed tactically and his team in a corset forced the could not fit her. Favre liked nothing to attach to his relief. Not the long list of injured, which had forced him in the occupation of the Defensive to Improvise. Not the lack of sprint in depth, sapping the people of Munich, according to the forces, and self-doubt-inspiring Cup game against Heidenheim should. Not the fear of the basic setting, the refusal would be any opposition, yet every tactic failed.

Dortmund sporting Director Michael Zorc spoke openly of his feeling, "that we were not up to the constellation of mental. We have made mistakes, have made some players for the last Time in the A-youth.“ Another of Dortmund's entourage spoke the sentence: "Today, men have played against the kids!"

Too late. Dan-Axel Zagadou not be able to prevent the hit to the 2:0, he is enabled by a blunder in the first place.Photo: dpa

Nothing in this Intonation was heard of Lucien Favre. He accepted the criticism with a Statement, which was not refer to exactly, whether it was humble or sarcastic words: "It didn't work. If you lose, the coach always to blame.“

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So would the words also Niko Kovac. The is not, of course, went to Jerome Boateng were the night followed by a reception at the P1. The Party-correspondents sighted twelve of the Bayern players, including Robert Lewandowski, the use of time prized you in exactly twelve minutes. With an appropriate counter-piece to his two goals and 90 minutes against Borussia Dortmund.