FC Bayern triumph in the cold and snow at Borussia-Park

The people of the Lower Rhine had been prepared for pretty much anything since Thursday evening at the latest. They had even had to close two indoor swimming pools in Mönchengladbach because the sudden onset of winter just before the weekend had brought extraordinary amounts of heavy, wet snow onto their roofs. Then, to make matters worse, FC Bayern came to Borussia-Park on Saturday evening – the leaders of the Bundesliga, who had demonstrated a huge, wintery hunger for goals in their last appearance of 2024 with an impressive 5-1 victory over RB Leipzig, and in the first friendly of the year with an impressive 6-0 win over FC Red Bull Salzburg.

Next winter chaos fails to materialise

Gladbach at least managed to avoid a flurry of goals in front of 54,042 spectators at the sold-out Borussia-Park. That said, the German record champions could easily have claimed another thumping victory with a bit more efficiency on the counter, instead of the narrow but fully deserved 1-0 win.

“It’s very important to start the year with a win,” said striker Harry Kane nonetheless. “The performance was very good, we created a lot of chances.” His penalty in the 68th minute proved to be the only goal of the evening. It was Kane’s 15th of the season, nudging him back in front at the top of the Bundesliga goalscoring chart. Someone had been counting: it was the 26th consecutive penalty in all competitions that the England captain had converted.

Two contentious penalty calls

The hosts, who battled bravely but were inferior for much of the game, were therefore left lamenting the awarding of the spot-kick. Germany striker Tim Kleindienst complained: “If you call that a penalty, then there’ll be 24 in every match.” The home side believed that referee Felix Zwayer was petty in his assessment of the contact by defender Lukas Ullrich on Michael Olise in the 66th minute, but they were lucky that Zwayer hadn’t earlier blown for a penalty for handball when Borussia captain Julian Weigl hit the ball against the arm of team-mate Rocco Reitz with an attempted clearance.

Nevertheless, after such a one-sided contest, Gladbach also conceded that the defeat was deserved on the whole. Bayern had 80 percent possession at times and registered 24 attempts to the Foals’ five. The first half was particularly dominant, with 377-122 passes in favour of the visitors, and even 131-9 in the attacking third, where the game had been played for well over 41 percent of the time. All that was missing was the redeeming goal, the one, decisive moment of brilliance that can make overwhelming dominance count.

‘It was a matter of time’

“With it being 0-0 at half-time and all the chances we created, it was only a matter of time until we got our first goal,” analysed Manuel Neuer, who returned in goal. The Bayern captain and his reshuffled defence – a faultless Eric Dier replaced the suspended Dayot Upamecano at centre-back – had little to do. Because Tim Kleindienst headed just over from the home side’s best chance, Gladbach didn’t register a single shot on target in 90 minutes. In their link-up play going forward, the German record champions, who attacked with their usual aggressive counter-pressing, got closer and closer to the opposition goal. But for all the commitment, desire and passion, the magic touch was missing.

More than a handful of chances

“It’s certainly a style of football that’s fun in training and on the pitch, and with which we can identify,” said Joshua Kimmich. “We had a lot of good chances.” Thomas Müller, in for Jamal Musiala, should’ve opened the scoring midway through the first half but was denied by the outstanding Moritz Nicolas in the Gladbach goal. Birthday boy Leroy Sané then fired over the vacant goal, before a handful of chances on the counter went begging. It therefore remained finely poised until the end, even though Gladbach only managed to establish a degree of balance in the first quarter of an hour after the break.

"It's always the talent and the mentality," was the summary of a satisfied Bayern coach Vincent Kompany. "It wasn’t easy. We had the chances in the first half, we were on top, but the chances were even bigger in the second half.We didn’t manage to put the game to bed. At the end of the day you have to score the goals, which we didn’t do. Then you just have to keep a clean sheet." Precisely that made the small but decisive different in the end on this cold winter's day in Mönchengladbach.

The full post-match reaction: