What an ass beating

Dude is doing an incredible job. Whoever hires him this summer is going to get a gem.

Leverkusen absolutely dominated Bayern. Xabi is a maestro.

since we don't do a lot of Bundesliga chat in here (rightly so given the state of the league), but it is definitely worth a Monday bump. Leverkusen absolutely thrashed Bayern. If you can find some extended highlights, it is well worth the watch.


https://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2024/feb/12/xabi-alonso-bayern-proves-leverkusen-can-end-tyranny-bundesliga

What do you mean the "State of the League"?

Legal Custodian said:

---

What do you mean the "State of the League"?

---

Come on. The Bayern domination is not good for viewers outside of the hardcore Bundesliga folks. Not only do Bayern win literally every single year. All of the teams sell on their best players to Bayern which would seen as absurd in most other leagues.

Furlock Bones said:

---

Legal Custodian said:

---

What do you mean the "State of the League"?

---

Come on. The Bayern domination is not good for viewers outside of the hardcore Bundesliga folks. Not only do Bayern win literally every single year. All of the teams sell on their best players to Bayern which would seen as absurd in most other leagues.

---

Agree to disagree

Holy crap. Upamecano gives up another penalty and gets sent off again after doing it midweek against Lazio.

Bayern were already getting whipped by relegation contenders Bochum. Now it's 3-1.

They're gonna be 8 points down now. Crazy stuff.

deadbq03 said:

---

Holy crap. Upamecano gives up another penalty and gets sent off again after doing it midweek against Lazio.

Bayern were already getting whipped by relegation contenders Bochum. Now it's 3-1.

They're gonna be 8 points down now. Crazy stuff.

---

I think the cracks in the Bayern foundation are finally coming apart. Not going to be able to paper over them with a Bundesliage title.

Something is in the water… I have a suspicion that there's toxic players who helped run off Nagelsmann for no good reason last year and now are reaping what they've sown (and are still unhappy).

Probably. But I think winning the league over and over with few real challengers has allowed the club to lose that focus on recruiting and rebuilding the squad.

This may be the wake up call to say hey this isn't good enough. We are a historic European squad and we have fallen behind.

Furlock Bones said:

---

deadbq03 said:

---

Holy crap. Upamecano gives up another penalty and gets sent off again after doing it midweek against Lazio.

Bayern were already getting whipped by relegation contenders Bochum. Now it's 3-1.

They're gonna be 8 points down now. Crazy stuff.

---

I think the cracks in the Bayern foundation are finally coming apart. Not going to be able to paper over them with a Bundesliage title.

---

Couldn't agree more, and those cracks started to show its ugly heads when Flick and Salihamidi started to have issues forcing Flick out just a year after the treble/sextuple.

I will try to find the post I made a year ago after Nagelsmann was sacked about the direction of Bayern being rotten to its core. They need to make huge changes right now to it's academies and player personnel decisions if they ever want to get back to their winning ways.

Every player besides Muller should be on the chopping block. And maybe Musiala.

They started this dynastic run back in 2010 when they grew their players from the ground up through their Academies. They had Alaba, Lahm, Mller, Schweinsteiger, Gomez. All those guys were 25-26 or younger at the time. Then they added Ribry and Robben to complete the team.

Then as those players got older and retired/moved on they decided to start relying more on replacing them by buying up and comers from elsewhere in the Bundesliga who felt they made it after arriving to Bayern. Right now I believe it's only Mller and Musiala who came up through Bayern Munich academies. They just bought 17yr old Tel who they should have been put into the academy for 2 years but instead they put him right into the starting lineup.

They're losing that Bayern work ethic that permeated thru the club that they cultivated through their training and academies. They've replaced them with lazy players and not to mention a terrible coach in Tuchel.

Sad thing is that Muller is past his prime, but they need to keep him around just to have his leadership/attitude. His press conference after Leverkusen was scathing.

deadbq03 said:

---

Sad thing is that Muller is past his prime, but they need to keep him around just to have his leadership/attitude. His press conference after Leverkusen was scathing.

---

Agree, he's the only one who still has the fire. He'll be the coach in 5-8 years

I'm super biased here, but another symptom of the rot is how Bayern seem hell-bent on poaching from Leipzig almost just to keep Leipzig down. And at every level… paying unheard of fees for coaches like Nagelsmann and sporting directors like Eberl.

And on the player side, I can't think of a single move that's really worked, and some may have been unnecessary and possibly even detrimental… I'd argue that y'all really didn't even need Sabitzer or Laimer, but taking our captain and another key midfielder away really screwed us. We're still weak at midfield. (Y'all can have Upamecano… he's one that I was happy to get the fee and see him leave.)

Someone should poll the German people of who they'd rather win the Bundesliga Title:

Bayern Munich for the millionth time in a row or Plastic Aspirin Leverkusen.

I'm sure it's overwhelmingly Bayern. Which is funny because they literally have one finger pointing back at them since 25% of Bayern is owned by Adidas, Allianz, and Audi. And I've gotta think that those corporations pull more than their share when it comes to organizational decisions. Members might own 75%, but it's kinda like US elections - we're hand fed certain candidates based on money and other BS that happens behind the scenes. It's a sham to think that massive organizations such as Bayern (or RM and Barca in La Liga) are truly member controlled. Lots of puppet masters behind the scenes.

The Bayern executive board is almost entirely corporate guys. Dortmund's chairman and vice-chairman are executives for Evonik and Signal Iduna. The guys with corporate money call the shots… these 50+1 fanatics believe a beautiful myth (reminds me of the student-athlete myth).

And the funny thing about the smaller member owned clubs in Germany is that they're typically ran by the politics of ultra groups who can vote en masse (i.e. Corps block). So while club ownership might appear democratic, it's really not. The loudest voices run the show, and they don't want to be made irrelevant if the 50+1 dies, so they make a big stink about it. Casual fans are frequently held hostage by their antics.

Even funnier is that Leipzig and Leverkusen joined Bayern and Dortmund in donating money to help keep small clubs afloat during the pandemic. Many clubs would be insolvent if it weren't for Leipzig and Leverkusen's "dirty" corporate money.

I'm sympathetic to the notion in Germany that they don't want sovereign owners with human rights abuses (that's the first thing 50+1 supporters bring up), but there are ways to regulate that without having 50+1.

/soapbox

deadbq03 said:

---

I'm sure it's overwhelmingly Bayern. Which is funny because they literally have one finger pointing back at them since 25% of Bayern is owned by Adidas, Allianz, and Audi. And I've gotta think that those corporations pull more than their share when it comes to organizational decisions. Members might own 75%, but it's kinda like US elections - we're hand fed certain candidates based on money and other BS that happens behind the scenes. It's a sham to think that massive organizations such as Bayern (or RM and Barca in La Liga) are truly member controlled. Lots of puppet masters behind the scenes.

The Bayern executive board is almost entirely corporate guys. Dortmund's chairman and vice-chairman are executives for Evonik and Signal Iduna. The guys with corporate money call the shots… these 50+1 fanatics believe a beautiful myth (reminds me of the student-athlete myth).

And the funny thing about the smaller member owned clubs in Germany is that they're typically ran by the politics of ultra groups who can vote en masse (i.e. Corps block). So while club ownership might appear democratic, it's really not. The loudest voices run the show, and they don't want to be made irrelevant if the 50+1 dies, so they make a big stink about it. Casual fans are frequently held hostage by their antics.

Even funnier is that Leipzig and Leverkusen joined Bayern and Dortmund in donating money to help keep small clubs afloat during the pandemic. Many clubs would be insolvent if it weren't for Leipzig and Leverkusen's "dirty" corporate money.

I'm sympathetic to the notion in Germany that they don't want sovereign owners with human rights abuses (that's the first thing 50+1 supporters bring up), but there are ways to regulate that without having 50+1.

/soapbox

---

That's a great soapbox, but it's also the 50+1 group that advocates for a lot of other stuff besides ownership configuration. Like when TV and Bundesliga started to move league matches to Tuesdays/Wednesdays. A quick uproar and boycott arose because the fans said these matches are made for the working class people who wish to attend or make weekend trips to matches and they quickly got rid of that idea.

Another one is ticket prices. There are countless protests on ticket prices which help the Bundesliga remain damn cheap.

Bayern has the success and marketing that provide it the opportunity to act like a big boy on the European scene. What's crazy to me is that every single fanbase is protesting these new rules even though these rules could provide their team the opportunity to skyrocket like Leipzig did. It's not just Bayern fans who "don't want the competition" but rather the entire league who don't want foreign investors to come into their league and mess up a good thing.

Which imo is the most fun league to watch on a week by week basis.

I get it. And I'm sympathetic at some level. A friend of mine lived in Leipzig for 6 months and he said it's great how cheap everything involved with a matchday is. You'll pay more for mid-tier college football games than you will for Bundesliga matches.

On the other hand, the ship has sailed in other leagues, so German clubs are going to get left behind financially if they don't change. It'd be one thing if UEFA as a whole had worked hard to keep clubs wholesome like Bundesliga tries to do, but they haven't. So it's an uneven playing field right out of the gates.

This latest round of protests seems particularly silly because presumably if the league as a whole is getting corporate partners, then all the clubs will benefit financially without having to compromise on their 50+1 or ticket prices. Seems like a great middle ground to me, but I'm Rotenbullen schweine, so what do I know.

Quote:

---

but I'm Rotenbullen schweine, so what do I know.

---

You said it, not me

Wow, even if this isn't true, the fact that such a thing exists is pretty damning:

• Players still behind Thomas Tuchel: Manuel Neuer, Raphaël Guerreiro, Jamal Musiala, Leroy Sané, Harry Kane, Eric Dier

• Players against Thomas Tuchel: Joshua Kimmich, Leon Goretzka, Thomas Müller, Matthijs de Ligt, Mathys Tel, Serge Gnabry

[@BILD]

— Bayern & Germany (@iMiaSanMia) February 20, 2024

deadbq03 said:

---

Wow, even if this isn't true, the fact that such a thing exists is pretty damning:

• Players still behind Thomas Tuchel: Manuel Neuer, Raphaël Guerreiro, Jamal Musiala, Leroy Sané, Harry Kane, Eric Dier

• Players against Thomas Tuchel: Joshua Kimmich, Leon Goretzka, Thomas Müller, Matthijs de Ligt, Mathys Tel, Serge Gnabry

[@BILD]

— Bayern & Germany (@iMiaSanMia) February 20, 2024

---

Who really knows, I've seen reports where Kane hates Tuchel and how he's being used too. Plus Musiala is too young to know any different.

But the one who is undoubtedly against Tuchel is Kimmich. And with the rumors of Kimmich looking to leave in the summer (after rumors of the same this past summer), Davies going to Real, Musiala going to Liverpool/City, Tel to Manu, Bayern will look mightily different this summer.

Neuer is too old now for me to care what he has to say, plus him almost having a career ending injury while skiing during the season last year made me think less of him and his desire to keep playing at a high level.

I'm ready for a hard reset and replace the team with some young academy studs, Muller, Pavlovic, and possibly Musiala. Then just start building up again. Move Muller to director of player personnel and training after a year or two. (If you can't tell already, my favorite Bayern player ever is Muller.)

Sounds like we are talking with Xabi (who isn't), Zidane, and Solskjaer. Zidane is a pipe dream I would kill for.

Zidane would be peak FC Hollywood… but also a risk, I think.

Speaking of risks, I can't believe they're keeping Tuchel around as a lame duck. I'm gonna make a bold prediction that they have to cut him loose after the Dortmund game in order to ensure a UCL spot. In doing so, I'm probably jinxing myself this weekend, so you're welcome.

deadbq03 said:

---

Zidane would be peak FC Hollywood… but also a risk, I think.

Speaking of risks, I can't believe they're keeping Tuchel around as a lame duck. I'm gonna make a bold prediction that they have to cut him loose after the Dortmund game in order to ensure a UCL spot. In doing so, I'm probably jinxing myself this weekend, so you're welcome.

---

It makes no sense to me either. Usually teams will get a bump after bringing on an interim just because of the Us vs Them mentality and letting loose a little bit which I think will do this Bayern team wonders. But because this team is so unpredictable this year, we'll probably come out and dominate Leipzig, beat Lazio 2-0 to advance to the quarters, and move within 5 points of Leverkusen after a weird loss for them. Then lose 3 in a row in league play until dominating Dortmund 5-0 to close out March.

I honestly have no idea how to think the rest of the season will finish, except I would be shocked to finish outside of the top 4 for the UCL next season. That would probably classify as the biggest European football collapse ever. And I think this year we (the Bundesliga) might get a 5th UCL spot guaranteed if things go well in the UCL or Europa competitions the rest of the spring.

I'm just so glad the Tuchel era is (close to being) over. I said it last season, one of the worst hires Bayern had ever made.

Again, I wasn't the biggest Nagelsmann fan, but we fired him for being down 2 points in league play in mid march with Der Klassiker coming up, and being undefeated and undrawn facing the toughest schedule in Champions League.

Seriously, we beat Inter & Barcelona twice in group play with a +16 GD and only conceding 2 goals in the 6 matches. Then we knocked off PSG in the first knockout stage. We had the easiest fixtures left in league play compared to Dortmund and we fired that coach midseason.

And yet we are 8 points down now, are on the brink of elimination against Lazio of all teams in the UCL, and there's internal strife everywhere in the club, but we decide to keep Tuchel on? Makes no sense. Management needs an enema.

As unlikely as it seems, Bayern falling outside Top 4 would be less shocking than Chelsea falling to mid-table. When the front office sucks, all bets are off.

And I'm with you - I feel like Leipzig will be a "show the world what we're made of" game but then they'll drop more points against minnows in March.

Looks like the protests worked

https://www.espn.com/soccer/story/_/id/39569286/german-league-abandons-private-equity-deal-fan-protests

Who needs that filthy 1 Billion Euro anyways?

deadbq03 said:

---

Who needs that filthy 1 Billion Euro anyways?

---

What was the plan to do with that money anyway? Just divvy it up between the clubs?

I agree with you that it seemed like no big deal but I also agree that the fanbases could see it as a slippery slope

Not directly. Sounds like it was shooting for long-term gains with most of it going to expand the brand internationally. Teams were going to get compensated for the rights being sold in the deal.

"The majority of the expected investment will go towards 'digitalisation and internationalisation' of the Bundesliga, including the creation of an in-house streaming platform. A further 100 million (US$108 million) is set to be allocated for clubs to enhance overseas growth with international tours. A further 300 million (US$324 million) will provide compensation for clubs' reduced TV and marketing income following the sale of the eight per cent stake."

Source: https://www.sportspromedia.com/news/bundesliga-dfl-clubs-vote-media-tv-rights-business-private-equity-investment/

Legal Custodian said:

---

And I think this year we (the Bundesliga) might get a 5th UCL spot guaranteed if things go well in the UCL or Europa competitions the rest of the spring.

---

I don't know think a lot of folks realize how much all these random UEFA games happening today matter to their leagues… the 2 extra spots are based solely on this year's coefficient, not the 5 year aggregate that determine the normal places and pots.

Frankfurt not doing us any favors today, getting bounced out of Conference League early.

But good news is that Freiburg advances in Europa. Hope they get a good draw. We'll need all the points we can get from them because things don't look too great in UCL. I'd be pleased if we manage to get two teams to advance. And the way things are going, I'd be stunned if we have anyone in the semifinals. And of course, we need Leverkusen to continue its brilliant season.

Oi, not a good start to the game for Bayern....again.

Wow. Looks like maybe the ball takes a tiny unexpected hop before it gets to him, but wow.

🚨🇩🇪 GOAL | Frankfurt 1-0 Heidenheim | Gimber (OG)

WHAT IS THAT??????? 😂😂pic.twitter.com/hgwoCXmeBd

— Tekkers Foot (@tekkersfoot) March 2, 2024

That sucks