Last edited:
Bundesliga 2017/18
- Thread starter uamini
- Start date
I do seem to remember Aymen Barkok robbing the ball from Arturo Vidal just outside the Bayern penalty area in Frankfurt last December. Vidal had no option but to drag Barkok down and give away a free kick as Barkok was clearly through on goal with Vidal the last man. . . . . Ref gave a yellow where it was clearly a red card. This in the fifth minute and all. Didn't help when Vidal went on to score the only goal of the match. Later on in the match Vidal committed another outrageous foul outside his penalty area on Marius Wolf. No second yellow card came . . . . and Juup Heynckes substituted him a minute later.
The referee, Harm Osmers, did find time for a straight red though. . . For a "foul" by Eintracht's Marius Wolf on James Rodriguez. Sadly for the ref he had to use VAR to change his decision, but, of course, in the past this wasn't available. When this occurred who was jumping off the Bayern bench demanding a straight red? One Arturo Vidal.
https://www.op-online.de/sport/eint...nach-spiel-gegen-bayern-muenchen-9439746.html
I've seen this sort of stuff time and time again with Bayern.
In 2013, again in Frankfurt, in Pep's second Bayern Bundesliga match, Bayern won 1-0 whilst Frankfurt had a perfectly good goal disallowed and a penalty denied in the last minute for a push on Alex Meier as he was through on goal.
Referees are human. They're supposed to be 100% impartial but they do carry inherent biases with them.
This is not a criticism of Bayern. It's just a reality that Bayern and their representatives have a lot of power off the pitch as well as clearly on it. Perhaps match officials feel that it wouldn't exactly be good for their careers if they find too much fault with Bayern?
I'm not the only one to observe this. Here is an article referring to a Bayern 3-1 victory over Hannover in 2015.
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...iga-suffers-from-referee-bias-in-hannover-win
The article above refers to a study carried out at the University of Hamburg where data over a 15 year period analysing both match winning and non match winning decisions found that "the most successful clubs during the observation period (Bayern and Dortmund) benefited most from referee's influence".
Of course the people I least expect to agree with on this issue are Bayern fans themselves.
Ironically the only matches I observe of Bayern where biases don't happen are in the Champions League where, of course, the match officials are not from the Bundesliga.
Last edited:
Yeah, that would be quite something, but even if we leave media reports aside, I think Dortmund is the most logical choice for Favre, he knows the league inside out has a good relationship with Dortmund's talisman and captain, already made a name for himself in Germany and Dortmund offer the right balance between ambition and patience for him.
He supports Frankfurt and doesn’t like Bayern. So this season the posting has gotten worse and worse.
Refs are always against Frankfurt. Refs always favor Bayern. Frankfurt getting smashed by Bayern‘s U23. stuttgart competing with Frankfurt for EL wins in Munich. Kovac (great coach!) is leaving them for the dark side (he always was a bad coach!). Etc, etc... It‘s quite annoying at the moment. Thankfully the Cup final is in the near future. Let‘s hope for a Bayern offside goal.
It's not boring. I've seen referee bias towards Bayern consistently.
Do you find it odd that in the past two Bundesliga seasons . . . Bayern have not had a man sent off?
https://www.ruhrnachrichten.de/Spor...B-Abwehrchef-stehen-auf-Abschied-1285104.html
RN reporting that Dortmund have stopped negotiations with Sokratis for a contract extension. They quote Zorc with "Our discussions have not revealed any basis for a contract extension thus far". Not exactly surprising news, but I reckon a Dortmund official would only make such a statment if his departure was all but certain.
On another topic:
How do we rate Herrlich's first top flight season? On one hand I credit him for trying to play dominant football and getting a lot out of youngsters such as Bailey and Havertz and breathing some life into Brandt and Volland, as well as apparently showing enough of a vision to get Brandt and Tah to extend their contracts, despite what I'm sure must have been very lucrative offers from better clubs.
On the other hand they botched a five point and goal difference lead on Hoffenheim in just four matches (vintage Leverkusen), being the only team that made Stöger's Dortmund look anywhere close to where they should be. I reckon with Hoffenheim and Leipzig being hampered with their first CL/EL season and Dortmund having a horrible season they really should have made top 4.
RN reporting that Dortmund have stopped negotiations with Sokratis for a contract extension. They quote Zorc with "Our discussions have not revealed any basis for a contract extension thus far". Not exactly surprising news, but I reckon a Dortmund official would only make such a statment if his departure was all but certain.
On another topic:
How do we rate Herrlich's first top flight season? On one hand I credit him for trying to play dominant football and getting a lot out of youngsters such as Bailey and Havertz and breathing some life into Brandt and Volland, as well as apparently showing enough of a vision to get Brandt and Tah to extend their contracts, despite what I'm sure must have been very lucrative offers from better clubs.
On the other hand they botched a five point and goal difference lead on Hoffenheim in just four matches (vintage Leverkusen), being the only team that made Stöger's Dortmund look anywhere close to where they should be. I reckon with Hoffenheim and Leipzig being hampered with their first CL/EL season and Dortmund having a horrible season they really should have made top 4.
Last edited:
In Bayern's last 82 Bundesliga matches they have not had a player sent off. This just defies logic and the law of averages. By Christmas it'll be 99 matches.
Yet in their last 46 Champions League matches they have had five players sent off as the referee is not from the Bundesliga.
Sokratis is gone, his performance this season was behind Toprak and Akanji and if they can get 20m€ for a 30-years-old CB, that would be fantastic. He was great next to Hummels for a few years, but without him he looked lost and it showed his weakness on the ball.
The CBs at Dortmund had a rough deal in the the last few years. No protection from midfield, a shaky GK and past it fullbacks are not an evironment to shine in. My guess is he goes to Arsenal because of the Mislintat connection and them badly needing a new CB after Per retiring and the Kos injury.
Regarding Herrlich's season, you mentioned all the big points on the positive side. The results should have been better, but he only missed out on the CL by goal difference on the last match day so that was as close as it could be. As is often the case with these all-attacking teams, sometimes they work beautifully (4-1 away at Leipzig) and sometimes they fail badly, especially against teams with higher individual quality (big losses against Dortmund and Bayern).
I am fine with Leverkusen playing EL because that is the competition where they can go far (semi final possibly) and I really really want to see Nagelsmann doing it against the big guns in the CL. He got it wrong badly against Liverpool, but in hindsight, TSG was just one of many teams having their asses handed to them by that attack, including the bestest PL team ever.
That logic is just faulty all around. In domestic games Bayern dominate heavily against weaker opposition, especially in recent seasons they had the title all but wrapped up before the winter break. In CL matches however the games are more open, the opposition is better, the scorelines are closer and the stakes are higher, thus it's only natural that more players get sent off there.
Well let's have a look at other teams dominant in their leagues.
Manchester City, pretty dominant we'd agree as they'll probably end up with 100 points and 105+ goals after today, . . . . two reds in 37 league matches this season.
Barcelona, dominant and unbeaten in Spain after 36 matches this season (90 points) . . . also two reds this season.
Yet Bayern 82 matches without a red in a league match Germany?
Literally 2 and a half seasons without a red
It doesn't matter how good a team is or the standard of opposition. Red cards are part of the game. They happen, sometimes deservedly, sometimes not, sometimes they're even just weird or crazy decisions. A mistimed tackle, a smart word to a match official, an off the ball incident, a professional foul, two innocuous yellows. . . these are nothing to do with the opposition. They're just random events which lead to reds.
So I suppose you're right. . . . Bayern very much are the exception to the rule.
Bayern have lost 4 BL matches out of 34. City 2 out of 37, Barcelona none out of 36.
Yes Bayern are dominant but don't try and get away with claiming that a team that gets 100 points out of a maximum 114 in England is not dominant or a team that goes unbeaten the entire season in Spain is not dominant.
Like I state. Dominance is not the issue.
Red cards happen. More often, I agree, to some teams over others. In many a case this is due to poor discipline of particular players (e.g. Ramos) rather than the quality of the teams themselves.
For Bayern to make it to two and a half seasons without a red is clear bias in their favour from match officials in Germany.
Yea, Raffael and Kruse weren't pure striker's themselves and really relied on one playing off the other, same with Reus and Hanke, I haven't followed Nice enough to judge how they have been playing though.
I don't know how Michi can work in that system, though you can make a case for Reus-Phillip/Schurrle playing in a similar way with Weigl and Dahoud in midfield. Both Phillp and Schurrle have experience playing in a central attacking role, Schurrle in his early days with Mainz and Phillip with Freiburg:
---------Back 4----------
-----Dahoud---Weigl----
Pulisic-------------Sancho
------Reus----Phillip----
Dahoud may not be as defensively strong as Neusdater or Nordveit then but he was very successful in Favre's Gladbach playing alongside Kramer, so he certainly has experience playing in a similar position.
Also, would like to mention that I wrote the article mentioned in the "more on that here" link in the zonalmarking article. Shout out
Oh, nice! I thought of quoting that one as well, but since I only wanted to give a few examples of what I was talking about, the other ones seemed enough already.Also, would like to mention that I wrote the article mentioned in the "more on that here" link in the zonalmarking article. Shout out
I'm really looking forward to watch Dortmund next season after losing a bit of interest during this one. And, assuming Favre takes over, I have no idea what we're going to see player and formation wise, which makes it all the more interesting.
WAZ, who are sort of reliable when it comes to Dortmund, are reporting that the club will be trying to offload as much as 1/3 of its squad. They name Sokratis [Arsenal supposedly being the most likely destination], Guerreiro, Sahin, Castro and Schürrle - so not exactly huge surprises on that list.
They also report that Dortmund and Favre have negotiated a two year contract with a one year extension option and that Dortmund fancy their chances of signing Bremen's Delaney, who supposedly also attracted offers from several unnamed PL clubs.
https://www.waz.de/sport/fussball/bvb/ein-drittel-der-bvb-mannschaft-steht-zur-disposition-id214277739.html?__pwh=yvt3KjGyS/eZx+wVHM7BPQ==
They also report that Dortmund and Favre have negotiated a two year contract with a one year extension option and that Dortmund fancy their chances of signing Bremen's Delaney, who supposedly also attracted offers from several unnamed PL clubs.
https://www.waz.de/sport/fussball/bvb/ein-drittel-der-bvb-mannschaft-steht-zur-disposition-id214277739.html?__pwh=yvt3KjGyS/eZx+wVHM7BPQ==
Last edited:
Yea, Raffael and Kruse weren't pure striker's themselves and really relied on one playing off the other, same with Reus and Hanke, I haven't followed Nice enough to judge how they have been playing though.
I don't know how Michi can work in that system, though you can make a case for Reus-Phillip/Schurrle playing in a similar way with Weigl and Dahoud in midfield. Both Phillp and Schurrle have experience playing in a central attacking role, Schurrle in his early days with Mainz and Phillip with Freiburg:
---------Back 4----------
-----Dahoud---Weigl----
Pulisic-------------Sancho
------Reus----Phillip----
Dahoud may not be as defensively strong as Neusdater or Nordveit then but he was very successful in Favre's Gladbach playing alongside Kramer, so he certainly has experience playing in a similar position.
Also, would like to mention that I wrote the article mentioned in the "more on that here" link in the zonalmarking article. Shout out
I thought about that front 4 today and I really like the look of it. Reus as the MVP of the side and I very much like Philipp because of his goalscoring and physicality. The problem is the defensive midfield because it lacks athleticism and Weigl has only ever been good at the base of a 433.
On the other side, Favre managed to make Xhaka work in a midfield two, which should count as one hell of an achievement. Xhaka and Weigl are similar kind of players and both should never work in a midfield 2, but if Favre did it with Xhaka, he may help Weigl to regain his form again.
Nice work on that article btw, that is one of my favourite Bundesliga teams of this decade.
Personally I think Götze has been Dortmund's most consistent offensive player behind Reus this season, so I'm expecting a three man midfield with both him and Weigl and either Dahoud or new box2box player to complement them.
In defense there are a lot of options.. I think Dortmund will try to sign a new LB who will be competing for a starting spot, but on the other hand Akanji did great in the few games he spent as LB, so I could see Dortmund going into the season with just him and Schmelzer there to compete for the spot, incase they can't find a good player for a fair price there. I could also see a back 3/5 with Piszczek als RCB, which might explain the supposed signing of Lichtsteiner.
In attack anything is possible I guess. Sancho, Philipp, Yarmolenko, Pulisic all have their pros and cons, so I think Reus - and maybe the new no9 should they make a big signing - will be the only constant up top.
In defense there are a lot of options.. I think Dortmund will try to sign a new LB who will be competing for a starting spot, but on the other hand Akanji did great in the few games he spent as LB, so I could see Dortmund going into the season with just him and Schmelzer there to compete for the spot, incase they can't find a good player for a fair price there. I could also see a back 3/5 with Piszczek als RCB, which might explain the supposed signing of Lichtsteiner.
In attack anything is possible I guess. Sancho, Philipp, Yarmolenko, Pulisic all have their pros and cons, so I think Reus - and maybe the new no9 should they make a big signing - will be the only constant up top.
Last edited:
There certainly will be a question of whether Weigl can work in a 2 man midfield but I look back to Kramer-Xhaka playing there, both of whom then seemed lethargic playing in other teams (Leverkusen and Arsenal respectively). Favre's system is not an all out pressing system like Bosz's, where Weigl struggled, but a smarter system which has an early press from the two forwards and then slowly falling back into a compact two banks of 4 system (similar to how Heynkes played in the latter stages of the UCL); Weigl can certainly succedd in a system where he can sit back and isn't responsible for aggressive pressing all the time.
With regards to Gotze, I think he'd be better off as one of the two upfront rather than playing deeper. He still has great vision and passing ability, so if he can develop a defensive game, he can maybe play in Weigl's position as the person to pass the ball forward from defense. Akanji has been great considering how young he is and also coming into a team midseason, though I think it's waste to have him at LB (I hope Guerriro isn't going to be sold).
Exciting season coming up for Dortmund with Favre.
With regards to Gotze, I think he'd be better off as one of the two upfront rather than playing deeper. He still has great vision and passing ability, so if he can develop a defensive game, he can maybe play in Weigl's position as the person to pass the ball forward from defense. Akanji has been great considering how young he is and also coming into a team midseason, though I think it's waste to have him at LB (I hope Guerriro isn't going to be sold).
Exciting season coming up for Dortmund with Favre.
I disagree on Götze, I think his biggest quality is his technique and robustness on the ball in tight spaces. Which is why he has been quite influental for Dortmund in a more lateral CM role, either offering himself as an option for penetrating passes between the lines or moving into the half spaces to facilitate combinations that would release one of the quicker players into space. Basically an insurance that you can transition the ball from the middle into the final third and from the sidelines into more dangerous areas of the pitch.
Last edited:
That is given he plays in a 4-3-3, but I was discussing the possibilities of Favre moving to his favoured 4-4-2 system and how Gotze would fit there. In a 4-3-3 we can agree that he can play a role alongside Weigl-Dahoud as an AM or Weigl-Reus as a CM. He has been impressive in the second half of the season, maybe should be considered for the WC squad.
When you stroll to the championship, it's not really difficult to go through a season without getting a man sent off. Did you watch that Dortmund-Bayern game in the 00s where they had like 10 yellow cards, 2 straight reds and a red after a second booking? That's how Bayern plays when the opponent is giving them trouble. I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying you have trouble accepting context and applying it to your argument.
If all competitive games are included in Germany (Bundesliga, DFB Pokal, Super Cup) then Bayern Munich have gone 97 matches without a red card.
That, as a statistic, is such an outlier that it raises questions of bias in favour of Bayern from match officials. By the end of August Bayern will have reached 100 competitive matches without a red card in Germany. I would be highly surprised if there was another club in Europe with such an exemplary disciplinary record.
I do not buy the argument of uncompetitiveness especially when I consider that Bayern regularly walk their way to the Champions League QF stage each year hammering teams along the way yet their disciplinary record in Europe appears much worse. Look at some of their results in Europe. . .
In the CL:
2017-18: 12 matches, 0 reds
2016-17: 10 matches, 2 reds
2015-16: 12 matches, 1 red [a straight red in a 4-0 home win over Olympiakos]
2014-15: 12 matches, 2 reds
2013-14: 12 matches, 2 reds
So a total of 58 matches and 7 reds over the past five seasons in the CL, but no reds in their last 97 matches in competitive German football.
A 12% probability of a sending off if the match is not presided over by a German match official as opposed to a near zero probability when it is.
Of course the corollary to the argument that Bayern have it so easy that they won't have players sent off in Germany is that the opposition also should take it easy, and just take their two punches a year without any suspensions for future matches. . . Like Hamburg usually do.
Yet in their 40 competitive matches of the 2016-17 season Bayern played in five matches where the opposition had a man sent off. . . .
Last edited:
Correlation isn't causation. The reason why they get less cards than anyone else is probably that they already have the ball most of the time. It's the perk of a possession based game that you already have the ball. And few fouls are committed while you already have the ball. This even ties in with your CL vs. Bundesliga argument, because let's be frank, the Bundesliga hasn't been much of a challenge since Dortmund crumbled. The CL, on the other hand, is giving Bayern quite the challenge year after year. As it should. But that also means Bayern isn't as dominant and as such commits more fouls. This has nothing to do with referee's favouring Bayern and everything to do with the difficulty of the matches and teams having an easy time playing fair when the opponent simply doesn't force them into errors.
Not to mention that even if we have a strong opponent in the league we know we could always get away with a few bad results so it doesn't make sense to risk too much with rash challenges/fouls. Best example of this is Vidal who mostly behaves in the league but shows a different face in (important) CL matches.
Go and look at Bayern's results in the Champions League. . . They only get tested when they play a Spanish team.
Their results show easy victories until they play either RM, Barcelona or AM.
Results this year show 3-0, 3-0, 3-1, 8-1 agg win over Besiktas. . . Last year 5-0 Rostov, 4-1 PSV, 10-2 Agg win over Arsenal, . . . .
When Bayern played Eintracht in December there were TWO opportunities in the same match to send off the same player, Vidal, and the referee did not produce a red card for either occasion.
On the issue of dominance, Manchester City won 100 points out of a maximum 114 this season. Scored 106 goals, conceded 27. . . Won 18 games in a row. . . Yet they still had two reds.
Last edited:
Talk of Slaven Bilic getting the job at Eintracht Frankfurt
Didn't get Bayern get two players sent off last year against Madrid?
I'm not sure what you're trying to say. So they only get tested against a Spanish team (or Neymar, apparently :P). That isn't exactly new information. Still doesn't really give evidence to referees favouring Bayern. I'm not even saying that referees aren't subconsciously making favourable mistakes. But you're talking about a large scale trickery that a number of referees are involved with... for a team that really doesn't need trickery to waltz through the league at the moment. It just doesn't make sense. What makes more sense is that less gifted teams resort to more physical play against Bayern to get an edge and perhaps steal a win, because that is how you win against Bayern these days. They hate people stepping on their toes. It may look one-sided if only the opponent gets booked, but it's hardly unexplainable without accusing referees of cheating.
Frankfurt are falling apart, aren't they? First they lose their keeper, then they lose their coach, then they lose EL/CL and all the money and pulling power that comes with it (not to mention that with all their loans they have to invest to even keep what they have), M. Wolf will be the next to leave for peanuts (nice timing, leaking that right now), Mascarell is in the hands of Real and the transfer window hasn't even opened yet.
For a club like Frankfurt it really is a blessing in disguise not having to play in the EL. That way they will at least not have any distractions next season when they will probably have to play for their survival in the league.
Hradecky was always going. Kovac screwed up the end of the season by placing his own ambition before the club. . . Hence he won't even have achieved more than what Armin Veh achieved in 2012-13. Mascarell is a Real player anyway who is supposedly on his way to Bayern also.
However losing Marius Wolf is a huge loss and for, as you say, peanuts. His release clause is €5m. . . WTF?
Whoever negotiates the contracts at EF needs replacing.
Wolf has been superb. Frankfurt gave him his Bundesliga opportunity and he more than grasped it with both hands. However loyalty is a rare commodity in football so I would definitely expect him to leave.
Literally three starting players for the cup final on Saturday and the manager are fecking off to other clubs after the match.
Mascarell must've improved a fair bit, was pretty mediocre at Derby.
Hasenhuttl leaves Leipzig . . . . .
Really? Been linked with Arsenal in the past so could be a late runner for that.
Yeah I saw that coming. Rangnick is a control freak, he is even responsible for the methods used in the training sessions. RB is the team with the second highest investment in the league the past few seasons and 6th place is not enough for that.
The whole construct reminds me of Chelsea (youth farm teams, weak managers, overdemanding boss, rich foreign owner), only on a Bundesliga budget and playing style, e.g. pressing like mad.
Official now
Adolf H to become Eintracht Frankfurt manager.
He can't be any more traitorus than Kovac
He can't be any more traitorus than Kovac
Arsenal now, or Bayern next year. Obvious Leipzig will snatch up Rose from Salzburg.
I was hoping he'd do better than he did at Leipzig but I'm interested in seeing where he ends up next.
I like Rose's style so it'll be interesting to see how he does. I see him in the same mould as Schmidt and Hasenhuttl.