Bundesliga: Neither Bayern Munich nor Borussia Dortmund deserve to be German champions

Soccer Bundesliga
Neither Bayern Munich nor Borussia Dortmund deserve to be German champions

A familiar picture: FC Bayern Munich celebrates its eleventh championship in a row.

© Federico Gambarini / DPA

Borussia Dortmund gambled away the championship on the last day of the game and gave Bayern their eleventh title in a row. But the Bundesliga final sprint was a snail race in which no one deserved to lift the championship trophy.

You had it in your own hands and then screwed it up: BVB turned into a dead end on the way to the championship at the last minute. FC Bayern Munich used the draw against FSV Mainz 05 in Cologne for a title that was hardly thought possible – because of the better goal difference. And because a 20-year-old shows no nerves and sends the Westphalians into tears.

It was an afternoon that you are no longer used to in football in Germany. Bayern are chasing on the last day of the game and the championship is far from decided. In the 89th minute, Jamal Musiala redeemed Bayern with his goal to make it 2-1, who brought the narrow lead through the rounds. For the last time in the 2018/2019 season, the Munich team only became champions on the last day of the game – BVB only looked into the tube there too.

The Bayern Dusel is back

The fact that Bayern celebrate their eleventh title in a row is a devastating signal to the league. In none of the past eleven years has the series champion been as vulnerable as this season. Instead of concentrating on what’s happening on the pitch, Munich degenerated into FC Hollywood in the 1990s. A questionable dismissal from the coach, the end of the DFB Cup and the Champions League, escapades by some players and endless debates about the board of directors around Oliver Kahn and Hasan Salihamidzic – who now have to leave the club as a consequence of the undesirable development. In addition, Munich showed themselves vulnerable despite or maybe because of the change of coach, lost against Leipzig and Mainz and also dropped points against Hoffenheim.

It would have been easy for the record champions to end the season without a title and put it off for the past few months. Bayern didn’t deserve to win the championship just because of the drama next to the field and many listless performances. However, a squad change after this not completely messed up season seems inevitable on and off the pitch. The fact that they are now ending the season with a title is probably due to the proverbial Bayern doze and the failure of the rest of the league as a whole and BVB in particular.

Because he once again showed an impressive nervous weakness in a crucial phase, which Mainz took advantage of ice cold. It is to the Mainzers’ credit that they didn’t give the game away. In the no man’s land of the table, the Rheinhessen could no longer make the leap to Europe or be relegated. It would have been easy to end the season without injuries and tick off the game if Bo Svensson’s team didn’t do it – as did 1. FC Köln, by the way, who stood up to Bayern for a long time. The Rheinhessen shouldn’t care that they not only made themselves a spoilsport and temporarily the most unpopular team in German professional football – in Munich and Gelsenkirchen you will see it differently.

At BVB, on the other hand, they will look for the reasons that did not lead to the championship. There is the mentioned mentality in decisive games. BVB could have equalized early on against Mainz, but Sébastien Haller lost his nerve from the penalty spot. In the second half, Dortmund left numerous top-class players behind. But BVB also disappeared in other important games of the season: the 2: 4 at Bayern was still flattering, Dortmund was played against the wall for over 90 minutes in the cup defeat in Leipzig, and he was eliminated from Chelsea, who were struggling this season BVB also ended without a word despite the success in the first leg.

One factor that accompanied Dortmund through the first half of the season is the great plight of injuries: in the first 17 games alone, BVB recorded 1,146 lost days, Bayern “only” 636. This showed how much the loss of Sébastien Haller in particular had an impact other face of Dortmund with his return. Dortmund had a target player and goalscorer who spurred on already-flopped Karim Adeyemi and Donyell Malen. There is no point in discussing whether BVB would have been champions with Haller who had been fit for a whole season – the fact that Haller returned to the pitch after his cancer and then returned so strongly is perhaps the best story of the Bundesliga season.

BVB leaves the points against small opponents

A final point at BVB should again be the point losses against the inevitably small clubs in the league. In the only home defeat of the season, Dortmund was still 2-0 up to the 89th minute against newly promoted Werder Bremen. In the second half of the season, with the draws at FC Schalke, VfB Stuttgart and VfL Bochum, the points that were now missing for the championship were given away. Four winless away games in a row in the decisive phase of the season since the end of March are simply not worthy of a championship contender.

So the Bundesliga final sprint degenerated into a snail race in which neither Bayern nor BVB really deserved to lift the championship trophy. The last time a champion ended up with so few points was in the 2009/2010 season – there, too, the champion was FC Bayern Munich, back then with 70 points and a time when the Bundesliga was still varied. And because there must somehow be a winner in inability, let’s take a modified quote from Gary Lineker: In the end, Bayern always wins – another champion would certainly have done the league good after eleven years. But Bayern really can’t do anything about that this time.

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