The formations adopted as the first half drew to a close.
Bayern Munich stormed back to the top of the Bundesliga with a professional performance against an alarmingly weak and lacklustre Freiburg side. Mario Gómez and Franck Ribéry were the goal-getting stars of the show, but not one man in red had a bad game – something that can’t be said for their white-shirted opponents, who look set for a season-long relegation battle.
The home side took hold of possession immediately, their initial tactic being to get Franck Ribéry on the ball; either by him coming deep to collect it, or through being fed on the overlap. The Frenchman had the trickery, pace and guile to truly trouble Stefan Reisinger and Maximilian Nicu early on, but Freiburg took advantage of their energy tanks still being full by flooding back in droves and covering the balls which entered Oliver Baumann’s box.
Bayern, who didn’t have to press that hard to force turnovers whenever deep and panicky Freiburg got their hands on a loose ball, took just seven minutes to go 1-0 up. Leaving a huge gap outside the box for Bastian Schweinsteiger to take the ball in and have a look, no pressure was applied on the German international who picked out Thomas Müller on the box edge – surrounded by bodies, but taking possession as if he had all the space in the world. He slipped in Toni Kroos through the left-hand side of the box, and the youngster squared for a Mario Gómez tap in! Continue reading
