‘We have to improve’

Bayern conceded three goals at home on Saturday for the first time since February 2011. Pep Guardiola was understandably displeased afterwards. “We have to improve,“ the Bayern boss declared, calling on his men to switch their focus immediately to Tuesday’s Champions League challenge in Manchester. Hoffenheim boss Markus Gisdol felt his team had enjoyed “a great day. We showed plenty of courage.”

Reaction to Bayern v Hoffenheim

Pep Guardiola: “All credit to Hoffenheim. Their pressing was excellent, but we found some good solutions in the first half. We didn’t play well in the second half. We need the ball. If we don’t have it we have a problem. We need to sit down and analyse this match and then quickly turn our attention to Tuesday. We have to improve.“

Tom Starke: “Not all of us were totally up for it, although we could still have won the game. But we didn’t fire on all cylinders today. Maybe we thought it was going to be easy. But we’ll learn from it. Today we proved we’re only human.“

Markus Gisdol (Hoffenheim coach): “Overall we showed plenty of courage. We had a really good day. Scoring three goals and earning a point here is very special for us. That represents a great day for us. We wanted to see how far we’d get if we pressed hard and high up the field. We wanted to push it as far as we could although we overdid it from time to time. We totally lost our grip on the match when Bayern were scoring their goals.“

Jannik Vestergaard (Hoffenheim): “We’re happy with the point. One or two of our shots on the break at the end might even have gone in, once Bayern threw everyone forward. That would have made it even better, although Robben had a huge chance at the end too so it could have finished 4-3 to Bayern. Taking a point here is great. We’re pleased because we worked very hard.“ 

Kevin Volland (Hoffenheim): “You have to dig deep and give it everything when you play Bayern. We played on Wednesday so we had a day less to recover. That makes it even better that we performed brilliantly as a team, we ran as if our lives depended on it, and we’ve ended up taking a point.“