Thomas Tuchel has not yet revealed his starting XI for the Bundesliga top game. The new Bayern Munich coach assumes that he will not be able to make a fair selection – which he explains simply. After all, the Munich squad is complete with two exceptions.
Thomas Tuchel has been the coach of FC Bayern for almost a week. That sounds like enough time to familiarize yourself with the team, have conversations with the players and get an overview in training of who is in good shape and who still has room for improvement. Not so with Tuchel. He started his new job as the successor to the sacked Julian Nagelsmann in the middle of the international break, while the majority of Munich footballers were with their national teams. This makes the 49-year-old hopeful of second place in the Bundesliga somewhat uncomfortable when it comes to selecting personnel.
“It will be a very unfair line-up against BVB,” said Tuchel in the press conference before the top game against leaders Borussia Dortmund (Saturday, 6.30 p.m./Sky and in the live ticker at ntv.de), and then explain what he meant by that. “Sometimes I have very few arguments to put someone up or leave them out,” said Tuchel. After all, numerous regulars were missing in the preparation for the top duel of this 26th match day because they were traveling with their respective country selection. The FC Bayern squad was only complete again this Friday.
“I’ll tell the team that too,” announced Tuchel, who, according to his own statement, is now coaching “a lot of players” at the German champions “who I’ve always wanted to train”. Tuchel didn’t want to say anything about the tactical orientation and the starting eleven, although he answered public questions for almost three quarters of an hour and was therefore pleasantly detailed. “Obviously I can’t reveal that,” he said ahead of the landmark clash that gave Dortmund the chance to extend their lead to four points with their first Bundesliga win in Munich since April 2014. Since that 3-0 away win back then, still with coach Jürgen Klopp, BVB have had nothing to gain from FCB. Since then, there have been eight defeats – including a 0:6, a 0:5, a 1:5 and 0:4 – when it came to points.
Tuchel sets a clear goal for Saturday evening
The change of coach at Bayern also makes preparation more difficult for the black and yellow, as Edin Terzić explained. After all, in Dortmund they “didn’t know exactly to what extent Thomas Tuchel will build on what Julian Nagelsmann has played in the past few weeks,” said the BVB coach, “or whether he’s bringing in a completely new idea”.
However, Tuchel indicated that he was not aiming for any radical change in his Bayern debut. There will be “no major changes in the system and processes,” he says. In terms of personnel, he only has to do without Mathys Tel (muscle fiber tear) and long-term injured Lucas Hernández (cruciate ligament tear). The recently injured Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting and Jamal Musiala are, according to Tuchel (“We can draw on unlimited resources”), on the other hand, ready for action again.
The 49-year-old, who is supposed to lead FC Bayern to the treble of the championship, DFB Cup and Champions League after Nagelsmann’s resignation, has identified “a very positive energy” despite the circumstances – and formulated the clear goal that only victory counts: “We want to go back to the top of the table.” If that succeeds as with the current national coach Hansi Flick, who once started his time as Munich head coach with the aforementioned 4-0 home win against Dortmund, collecting the missing training impressions should be much more relaxed. But there isn’t much time anyway, because it’s already on Tuesday (8.45 p.m. in the live ticker at ntv.de) the next groundbreaking challenge awaits with the DFB Cup quarter-finals against SC Freiburg.