this is what happens when you don’t commit to defending

By: j | October 25th, 2008

I suspect frequent readers to this blog might get a trifle annoyed with my rather dowdy, out-of-fashion insistence of never losing focus upon defense or in-fact “dictating” your oppositions attack through your own defensive strategies. However winning Football must recognize this or your efforts to advance will be thwarted and as you will feel a stern response when facing superiour competition. This is precisely what happened today as Bayern München came back with four unanswered goals to defeat Wolfsburg 4-2.

At the start of the campaign, the additions of Cristian Zaccardo and Andrea Barzagli led me to believe that the club would place a heavier emphasis on defending and additionally know how to padlock a match down. However at this stage, they have for the most part eschewed a style best described as “the best defense is a good offense” approach, effectively leaving their back-line on a limb to defend. Unfortunately that approach isn’t effective in the upper reaches of Football and if Wolfsburg is serious of a European bid they will need to address this or situations such as today will be repeated.

Wolfsburg opened the scoring on a questionable penalty judgement of Martín Demicheli defending on Grafite at the half-hour mark that if truth be told, looked to me more of a dive. Gifted the penalty, Grafite dispatched the ball to the back of the net to give the visitors a 1-0 lead. Edin Džeko doubled the margin only two minutes later heading in a perfect cross from Japan international Makoto Hasebe only two minutes later. Unfortunately for Wölfe supporters they were unable to control the match and quickly Franck Ribéry worked his magic, drawing a goal back four minutes before the break. As the match restarted, Bayern was in clear control of play, dominating possession and worked the ball tactically up the pitch. Ten minutes after the break Mark van Bommel headed-in a rebound of Miroslav Klose’s drive to draw the match even. Bayern showed its champions spirit, smelled a wounded opposition and continued to drive forward looking for blood with Tim Borowski pocketing the eventual winner at the eighty-third minute. With ten minutes remaining Bastian Schweinsteiger scored from point blank rank to give Bayern München a well-deserved 4-2 victory.