‘We need to take a good look at ourselves’

It was a long night in the Klinsmann household on Saturday. The Bayern boss reviewed his side’s 5-1 defeat in Wolfsburg in its entirety, pausing the DVD to analyse each of the goals conceded by his team “ten or fifteen times,” he revealed to FCB.tv. What he saw gave cause for concern. “It was déjà-vu. We again lacked an element of resolve,” Klinsmann grimaced, acknowledging he was “angry” and “bitterly upset”.

However, there was no need for raised voices in Sunday morning’s team talk. “It was calm, but pointed,” Klinsmann reported after running through the previous day’s errors. “The clear message was for everyone to go home and take a good look at himself. Every player needs to look in the mirror and ask whether he gave his all for Bayern Munich.”

“The alarm bells are ringing,” the head coach admitted in the wake of his side’s heaviest defeat of the season. Bayern are down to fourth in the Bundesliga standings, with the associated danger of missing out on qualification for next term’s Champions League. “I urgently need everyone to grasp what’s at stake here: the whole of the year 2009 for Bayern, the future of the club,” the coach declared.

Desire and mental strength

Klinsmann’s fear is that last season’s domestic double has caused the players to focus too heavily on the Champions League, to the detriment of the bread-and-butter of the Bundesliga. “We can’t allow this, it would be fatal,” Klinsmann warned, demanding a return to “resolve and sacrifice” in the league, qualities the team has shown in abundance in European competition.