FC Bayern Munich successfully completed the dress rehearsal before the Champions League semi-final on Tuesday (April 30, 2024, live ticker at sportschau.de) against Real Madrid – and thanks to Harry Kane, Eintracht Frankfurt will be with Eintracht Frankfurt on the 31st matchday of the Bundesliga Defeated 2:1 (1:1).
Kane gave Munich the lead in the 9th minute on Saturday (April 27th, 2024), and Hugo Etikité equalized in the middle of the first half (23rd). After a pointless penalty from Robin Koch on Thomas Müller, Kane made it 2-1 for FCB after an hour. “Relatively unfortunate,” is how Frankfurt coach Dino Toppmöller described the winning goal in an interview with Sportschau.
Bayern Munich coach Thomas Tuchel was not dissatisfied with his team’s performance a few days before the semi-final first leg in the Champions League against Real Madrid. He told the sports show: “The best preparation is a win.”
Laimer’s conquest of the ball in front of Bayern’s opening goal
Müller missed the first big chance of the game. After a combination via Raphael Guerreiro and Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting, he chased the ball just over the crossbar (5th). As a result, Frankfurt allowed themselves to be pushed too far into the defensive and showed insecurities in building up the game – Konrad Laimer took advantage of this to win the ball in midfield and set up Kane’s 34th goal of the season with a perfect cross pass.
Bayern continued to press forward with a lot of pressure and Frankfurt had no access to the game at all. After a good 20 minutes it could have been 3-0 or 4-0, but Choupo-Moting, Kane and Eric Dier missed further good opportunities.
Etikité scores for Frankfurt out of nowhere
During this phase, Eintracht staggered around the pitch rather disorientated, but then suddenly found themselves back in the game with their first dangerous action ever. National goalkeeper Manuel Neuer initiated a Frankfurt counterattack with an inaccurate shot, William Pacho set up Etikité, who passed Laimer and Müller and gave Neuer no chance with a 20-meter shot into the right corner.
Encouraged by the equalizer, Eintracht subsequently gained significantly more traction in their attacking actions towards the goal. Müller was initially denied by Kevin Trapp from a tight angle, then Éric Dina-Ebimbe and Ansgar Knauff could have scored on a two-on-one counterattack to give Frankfurt the lead.
Guerreiro misses a huge opportunity for Munich
Shortly before the change, FCB actually had to add the second goal, but Guerreiro managed the trick of hitting a cross pass in front of the Eintracht goal so wrong that the ball hit the post from a short distance and from there back into the goal von Trapp’s hands bounced.
After the break, the Munich team were no longer as focused as they were at the beginning of the first half. However, Frankfurt did not play its own attacks with the utmost consistency, so the action became somewhat flat.
Cooking misfires damage unity
An individual misfire by Koch then tipped the game back to the hosts’ side: for no apparent reason, the Eintracht defender slammed his elbow into Müller’s head in the penalty area, and after VAR intervention, referee Daniel Schlager had no choice but to go for it point to show. Koch was well served with the yellow card, but it still did enormous damage to his team: Kane safely converted the penalty and increased his goal tally to 35.
Frankfurt goalkeeper Kevin Trapp later defended Koch: “I’ve known Robin long enough, that’s never intentional.” And Thomas Müller said: “It was a strange movement, suddenly his elbow ended up in my mouth.”
Bayern then played the game home quite confidently. The defense was secure, although Mathijs de Ligt was no longer able to contribute after a head hit in the second half and Leon Goretzka even helped out on the right defensive side at the end. With a total of almost two thirds of ball possession and a pass rate of over 90 percent, the success was ultimately fully deserved. Müller almost made it 3-1 in stoppage time.
Bayern in Stuttgart, Frankfurt against Leverkusen
After the Champions League semi-final against Real on Tuesday, Bayern have to face VfB Stuttgart in the Bundesliga (Saturday 05/04/24, 3:30 p.m.), Eintracht Frankfurt hosts the German champions Leverkusen (Sunday 05/05/24, 5:30 p.m.: 30 p.m.) – as always, both games are available in the live ticker at sportschau.de.