You had to wait a long time for this moment in Munich.

You saw men in leather pants hugging each other.

You saw women in dirndls looking at it.

You saw people who were finally allowed to celebrate.

You could feel folk festival vibes.

So that's what it's like when FC Bayern wins the Bundesliga again.

Christopher Meltzer

Sports correspondent in Munich.

  • Follow I follow

On Friday evening, FC Bayern won 4-0 against Bayer Leverkusen - and in autumn 2022 that is really a sentence with news value.

Including the international break, it has been almost six weeks since Bayern won a game in the Bundesliga.

Such a series is enough – wins in the Champions League (2-0 against Inter Milan and FC Barcelona) or not – to be able to speak of a small crisis in Munich.

On Friday, coach Julian Nagelsmann and his team used an effective antidote: four goals in their own arena.

Later in the evening, Nagelsmann sat there on the podium in the press room and said: "We made better use of the chances to score." We, that was Leroy Sané (3rd minute), Jamal Musiala (17th), Sadio Mané (39. ) and Thomas Muller (84th).

And what did Nagelsmann say about himself after he announced before the international match that he wanted to think "about everything"?

"I didn't do anything differently." That's what a coach says, who believed he had found evidence for his thesis in the 90 minutes beforehand.

Conversion of chances was the problem

The day before the game, Nagelsmann said in his press conference that his team had collected 93 shots on goal in four games without a win.

"We didn't use a couple of situations the way we can use it," he said.

"We didn't design a few goal-scoring situations the way we should." That's his thesis: The reasons for the four games without a win can be found neither in the structure nor in the system, but in the exploitation of chances.

There are several reasons that his thesis is correct, but on this evening there was also one reason against it: the opponent.

No team in Munich has been as inferior as Leverkusen this season.

At 0-1, Musiala sprinted away from left-back Mitchel Bakker.

At 0:2 the ball slipped under the arm of goalkeeper Lukáš Hrádecký.

At 0: 3, Mané was allowed to shoot from the edge of the penalty area.

And at 0:4 Hrádecký slipped.

"What can't happen is that you can fall behind early on," said coach Gerardo Seoane.

"Unfortunately that happened."

The game lacked tension, which is why you couldn't look into the south curve.

There, the FC Bayern fans had prepared several banners.

One said: "State visits, training camps, thousands of deaths for World Cup celebrations... It's only better for your own conscience, Uli H." TV show Doppelpass called to report progress on working conditions in Qatar.

Another read: "Solidarity with the Feminist Revolution in Iran".

Solidarity with the feminist revolution in Iran.

They showed that when Iran international Sardar Azmoun, who plays for Leverkusen and supports the protests in his home country, came on.

Unlike his political statements on his Instagram account, Azmoun made no difference on the pitch.

He was powerless against Dutch centre-back Matthijs de Ligt, who made his game for Bayern that evening.

"Very, very good," said Nagelsmann later, "the stable player that we were hoping for."

On Tuesday, Nagelsmann and his team will continue against Pilsen in the Champions League (6.45 p.m. in the FAZ live ticker for the Champions League and at Dazn).

And as long as?

Oh yes, Oktoberfest is still there.