A week is a long time in football, especially when you lose your Bundesliga crown. But for Bayern Munich, three wins from three games against FC Köln and Union Berlin in the league, and Arsenal in the Champions League Quarter-finals has lifted morale.
After the emphatic 5-1 victory away to Union, Head Coach, Thomas Tuchel, was effusive about his side’s performances in the last seven days.
Doing the right things in the right moments
“We’re happy. It was the perfect end to a perfect week with three wins.
“You can’t take that for granted. My compliments to the team. It was a team effort because it was a complicated game. Union played with two strikers and two number 10s, which meant a lot of work for our defenders.
“We scored in the right moments. It was a very good performance. We have the highest demands of ourselves and we want to win wherever we go.
“We played with great focus, we deserved to win today. It was very physical, especially in the first 20 minutes, we had to work hard and we showed our strength. We weren’t tired but it was intense and we did the right things in the right moments.
“At half-time, I praised the performance but asked for more. We came out, pushed and the second half performance was better. It was a good win, a perfect week.”
Looking ahead to Real Madrid
With a Champions League semi-final against Real Madrid to look forward to, Tuchel was cautious about over-optimism and said no-one was guaranteed a starting spot, even Thomas Müller after scoring a brace in his 400th start for the club.
“Thomas Müller isn’t guaranteed to start (against Real Madrid). His form wasn’t good but his goals were. He scored, yes, great, helped set up the first. He agreed that he is capable of more.
“Leon Goretzka has been good. A great goal and he has found his form in recent weeks. He has been perfect this week.
“(But) Real Madrid will obviously be different today. Different set-up, different quality, everything is different.
“Today gave us confidence, belief in ourselves. Against Arsenal we played like a team, today we had more changes and we were a team again, but today has no impact on Real Madrid.
“We are still missing lots of important players. We are still missing a lot of wing players. Everyone is training well, in good form, and we have lots of candidates for the team. We now have two days off and I don’t know who is playing against Frankfurt but I have time to think about it.”
An unstoppable force
Thomas Müller was equally full of praise for his side.
“We delivered a good performance. We were more aggressive and subsequently won possession high up the pitch.
When we did lose the ball, Union occasionally showed us the damage they can cause with their counter-attacks.
Overall, however, we were aggressive and didn’t allow Union to score an easy goal. The second goal just before the break obviously played into our hands. We got rolling at the beginning of the second half, we were unstoppable and deserved to win by this margin. It’s been a perfect week with three wins.”
Now sitting second and three points clear of Stuttgart in the Bundesliga, Bayern’s focus turns to Real Madrid and hopes of winning a record seventh Champions League title.
