After 75 minutes, the time was ripe for Julian Nagelsmann to present the Munich youth research project.
Eight young players sat on the Bayern bench, and the fact that his choice fell on Lucas Copado and Paul Wanner was a good fit.
For one thing, the coach made Hasan Salihamidzic a little proud.
Not because, as the sports director, he is also responsible for the further development of the talent factory, but as an uncle.
Copado is his nephew, who also made a decent Bundesliga debut in the 1: 2 match against Borussia Mönchengladbach. On the other hand, Nagelsmann has made sure that another entry is made in the record books of the record champions. Not with Copado, he's a bit too old at almost 18 for that. In contrast to Wanner, the other newcomer of the evening. This - according to Nageslmann - "incredible talent" replaced Jamal Musiala as the youngest Bundesliga player in the Munich club's history at the age of 16 years and 15 days.
However, this event was the only one with which Bayern broke another record at the beginning of the new year, at least the only positive one.
Because the 1: 2 at the beginning of the second half of the season is somehow historical.
In the three games against Mönchengladbach this season, the Munich team only managed one draw, with Nagelsmann believing that the defeat was "rather undeserved", unlike in the cup, of course, when Bayern got 5-0 down, and also unlike the 1-1 draw at the Bundesliga start in August, the Bayern coach stated that “we were the better team today”.
"That got us out of step"
At least not the worse one, despite the total of twelve failures. Apart from the last 20 minutes of the first half, however, in which the Munich team gave up the game after Robert Lewandowski's lead and only got it back under control after the break, but then failed to exploit numerous chances, either on Aluminum or Gladbachs Goalkeeper Yann fail, or sometimes just didn't hit the ball properly.
The equalization by Florian Neuhaus fell "out of nowhere" after just under half an hour, stated Serge Gnabry. The Munich had tried in front of their own goal to clear with the hoe instead of simply knocking the ball away without any frills, and thus enabled the Gladbachers to take their first shot on goal. The equalizer, admitted Gnabry, “threw us out of step.” Four minutes later, Benjamin Pavard thought that the pandemic distance rule might also apply in the penalty area, which is why he let Stefan Lainer score the 2: 1 with a head after a corner kick .
After all, it speaks for Bayern not to have lamented afterwards that more than a complete team was not available due to nine positive corona tests, the Africa Cup participation of Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting and Bouna Sarr and the injury by Leon Goretzka, and that the German Football League had refused a postponement of the game that the Munich team wanted. “The omens were not perfect,” said Thomas Müller. “But they didn't bother us pressing on goal either. We had a decent troop. "
The list actually didn't read badly. In Malik Tillman, Nagelsmann only had to make a starting XI debut for one player, the other ten were all seasoned professionals. However, some with handicaps. Joshua Kimmich was back on the field for the first time in nine weeks after his corona quarantine and his illness, Marcel Sabitzer, who had been injured for a long time, for ten weeks, and he "was dead after 60 minutes," said Nagelsmann. And nobody sat on the bench from whom Nagelsmann could have expected new impulses or who, by virtue of his name, inspires the opponent a little bit of respect, but only talents.
In addition, there were new areas of responsibility in their job profile for a few professionals - or they returned to old ones, at least, as Nagelsmann admitted, one or the other “did not play in his best position”. Or not on his dearest one, like Kimmich, who had to help out on the right in the back, where he was regularly to be found until two years ago. The Bayern coach had to try Musiala as a defensive central midfielder in the old year due to staff shortages.
He ordered Sabitzer to the right defensive side that the Austrian did not feel completely comfortable there, it could be seen, and that had nothing to do with the dwindling forces mentioned by Nagelsmann.
Kingsley Coman and Corentin Tolisso will soon be returning to training, but they were also absent for a longer period before Christmas due to injuries and are therefore probably only available as part-time jobbers at first.
The Munich experimental phase continues.
Probably also the youth research project.