Ahead of the two-week international break in the Bundesliga, FC Bayern made a serious statement to the rest of the league on Sunday evening. At the end of Matchday 20, the men from Munich beat Hertha BSC commandingly, running out 4-1 winners. "We had Berlin pinned down right from the start and didn't let that go to waste at all, and we had chance after chance. A very good afternoon of football," a satisfied Thomas Müller said, scorer of the opening goal of the game. "Overall, it is a deserved win and a very good game from us," said head coach Julian Nagelsmann. fcbayern.com has match reaction from those involved.
Reaction from the Bayern camp:
Julian Nagelsmann: "I'm very pleased with the performance. The first half was a bit stronger than in the return fixture. Our players were extremely sharp in their counter-pressing. We had many chances from our possession. In the second half, Hertha were a bit better. Overall, it's a deserved win and a very good game from us."
Manuel Neuer: "It was very positive. Hertha were a bit tired. For us, it was clear that we would go for it going forward. We won the ball well. We can be incredibly satisfied with our performance."
Thomas Müller: "We played well. We had a lot of attacking players on the pitch. We were looking forward to the game because we knew what we were going to do today. On the other hand, of course, you never know how an attacking wing pairing of Coman and Gnabry will work. The first half was maybe even a bit better than the second because we had more control. Our counter-pressing was a bit better, we allowed practically nothing. We had Berlin pinned down right from the start and let nothing go to waste, and had chance after chance. A very good afternoon of football."
Joshua Kimmich: "It's really fun to be back on the pitch. In general, we played very well and controlled the game for 90 minutes. We wanted to focus on our counter-pressing. We hadn't done that quite as well in the last few games. That was good today, we won the ball up high a lot and one or two chances to score came from it. Especially in the first half, the score could've even been a bit higher."
Reaction from the Hertha camp:
Tayfun Korkut (Hertha BSC's coach): "If you want to have any chance at all in a game like this, you need a few things to come together. We need to be defensively faultless, have a bit of luck and make the most of the chances we got. We didn't have two of those. We had a bit of luck in one or two moments, but we made clear errors with their goals. And the chances we had, we didn't take advantage of. We came up against a very focussed Bayern team."
Linus Gechter (Hertha BSC): "We have to brush ourselves down and move on. We fought, which is what we set out to do after the last few games. It's brutally tough playing against Bayern. Personally, I felt well prepared. It just ended badly. We still have to work on lots of things."
The match report:
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