Monday night’s 3-1 friendly win away to third division Dynamo Dresden was a highly productive exercise for Bayern in two main respects, as Pep Guardiola took the opportunity to hand a clutch of squad players some valuable playing time, and the financially stricken home club benefited from all the revenue generated by the prestige fixture.
Arjen Robben, Arturo Vidal and Juan Bernat scored Munich’s goals in a useful early-season workout for the German champions, although the big moment for most of a soaked but boisterous 30,730 crowd at the Stadion Dresden was sub Pascal Testroet’s late consolation.
Guardiola’s starting line-up, a mix of established stars such as club captain Philipp Lahm, Mario Götze and Robben and youngsters including Joshua Kimmich and Fabian Benko, instantly slipped into the groove on a rain-sodden evening in the east of the country, with Robben hitting the post at point-blank range from a Bernat cross after nine minutes.
FCB keeper Sven Ulreich made a sharp near-post save from Niklas Kreuzer on a rare Dynamo foray but it was all FCB in the first 20 minutes, Robben failing to beat home keeper Patrick Wiegers with a cheeky lob but going one better on 17 minutes with the opening goal from a perfectly-weighted Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg through ball. The third-tier high-flyers settled to the task after that and the game became bogged down in midfield through to half-time.
Local youth product and current FCB backup keeper Tom Starke was one of Bayern’s half-time subs, and another of them doubled the lead three minutes after the restart when Vidal’s deflected shot from Hojbjerg’s second assist of the night looped unstoppably into the far corner of the net.
Starke made a superb reaction save to deny Tim Väyrynen after an hour, but at the other end substitute Thomas Müller came close to increasing the lead before teeing up Bernat, played onside by the dawdling Kreuzer, to slot home the 74th-minute third. The victory was clear enough but there was a treat for the home faithful at the end when sub Pascal Testroet triggered wild celebrations by rounding Starke and slotting home a consolation goal.
Live match report for fcbayern.de by Chris Hamley
Topics of this article