Defeats, moments of happiness and a balancing act

Dear basketball friends

Dear fans of FC Bayern Basketball,

When our team meets for the first time, usually in the third week of August, our goals are usually: to have a chance to win in every game if possible and preferably to win the very last one. We didn't manage the latter and after 84 games in EuroLeague, BBL and Cup our season is over since Sunday.

As with each of you, the disappointment sits deep.

But just as we congratulated FC Barcelona on reaching the Final Four after the EuroLeague playoffs, we now congratulate Alba Berlin fairly on the title. It is well deserved after an outstanding season.

Despite all the frustration, Sunday also had a very pleasant aspect: the atmosphere in the Audi Dome was terrific until the end, despite the clear result. You cheered and celebrated our team for 40 minutes. That was outstanding and speaks for a fine feeling for the situation of our team, which was exhausted in the end - many, many thanks for that. 

That's why, despite the defeat, the last home game in 2022 gives us great confidence. After all, a year ago our spectators sat at home for almost the entire season, with 20 percent of capacity admitted in the final games. In the season that has just ended, we were once again the only team in the EuroLeague that had to play around a dozen games without fans.

The Biggest Motivation

It wasn't all that long ago, but that's something you almost forget in these complicated times with war and its side effects: Those little moments of happiness that we in the club - and hopefully you as well - were given during a changeable season, especially with sold-out festivities like against Barcelona or also last week against Berlin.

Our team reached the EuroLeague playoffs again, despite all the obstacles, and the exciting series against Barça will go down in our club history. In the end, however, we probably paid a price for this tremendous performance. Just like last year.

The balancing act between the competitions and our own demands - which are certainly higher than elsewhere - was difficult to manage even with acrobatics. We've had another complicated and difficult season, in which we sometimes didn't know what to do the next morning.

Like our fans, our team and staff put an incredible amount of heart and enthusiasm into a season in which the audience finally returned to the Audi Dome. But at the end of the day we now have a result and we will analyze how we can master the triple load even better than in the past two years.

The future is too exciting not to be prepared for it in the best possible way. In just over a year, we'll be moving into the SAP Garden as our second venue alongside the Audi Dome, and that alone is a commitment.

But the greatest motivation is and remains you: those who entertain our team, who provide it with moments of happiness through victories and action. Our fan base and our partners remain our greatest motivation to make a new attempt in the third week of August 2022.