Bayern Munich and their key questions for the new Bundesliga season

New York Times

3 days ago

Bayern Munich had a good night at the end of a strange summer.
Vincent Kompany's side won the Franz Beckenbauer Supercup on Saturday night, beating Stuttgart 2-1. But the club's transfer activity has been criticised throughout the pre-season, and while Bayern are no doubt strong enough to retain the Bundesliga, that is not all that is asked of them.
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Bayern will enter the new season — which will begin against RB Leipzig on Friday night — with plenty of questions to answer.
Here, The Athletic's Seb Stafford-Bloor examines those questions and explains why they are concerns before the new season.
It is unlikely that Musiala will play again competitively this year after suffering an ankle fracture at the Club World Cup. Replacing the 12 goals and two assists he provided in the league last season might not sound too onerous but Musiala's influence has become extensive under Vincent Kompany. He is a leading playmaker and among Bayern's most elusive ball-carriers, but his receiving positions became much deeper during Kompany's first year, so his absence will leave a gap right through the middle of the pitch.
In Saturday's Supercup win, he was not missed. Michael Olise was moved infield from the right, playing between Luis Diaz and Serge Gnabry, and behind Harry Kane. The unit functioned well individually and collectively, especially on the counter. Olise, especially, was a menace.
More creative solutions will be needed, though, because the same four players cannot start every game between now and the winter break. Kompany will have to get imaginative. Tom Bischof might be pushed further forward, even though he arrived this summer having predominantly played as a deeper No 6 or No 8 for Hoffenheim. Leon Goretzka could be redeployed in more advanced positions, too, and Kompany has previously used the versatile Raphael Guerreiro as an emergency attacking midfielder.
The temptation is to think that Bayern will cruise through the first half of the season without Musiala and navigate the low-stakes Champions League league stage with little difficulty — but as has been shown in the past, they can be blunt without his specific abilities, and their ball circulation can become too predictable. They need to cut through weaker teams, particularly if the physical debt from their Club World Cup campaign starts to catch up with them. Musiala can be highly effective against low blocks, making his absence extremely unhelpful, regardless of Bayern's many advantages.
The pursuit of Nick Woltemade seems to be over. Woltemade had an excellent season for Stuttgart last season and was top scorer at the European Under-21 Championship with six goals. Bayern have made three bids and Stuttgart have rejected each one, insisting that he is not for sale.
Stuttgart would have to be offered a preposterous fee to change their stance and Bayern have other options. Christopher Nkunku is a target but he is not an orthodox centre-forward. Bayern will begin the season with Kane as the only natural fit for that position.
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The assumption that Kane is fragile is false. He has appeared in 63 of Bayern's 68 Bundesliga games since joining the club in 2023, and one of those matches was missed through suspension. Nevertheless, Bayern have always had other forwards capable of sharing the burden: last season, Olise had 27 goal involvements (12 goals, 15 assists) in the Bundesliga and Leroy Sane had 16 (11 goals, five assists).
Even when Bayern were a more powerful side overall, they could always call on productivity from their bench. During Robert Lewandowski's final season in 2022-23, Eric Choupo-Moting provided a further 10 league goals. In 2013-14, Pep Guardiola's first season, Mario Mandzukic (18 Bundesliga goals) most often led the line, with Mario Gotze (10 goals) also playing that slightly awkward false-nine role and Claudio Pizarro averaging a goal every 70 minutes (10 in total) in a supporting role.
Kane is Kane. He will score goals, and if he does not collect the Torjaegerkanone (Bundesliga top scorer award) at the end of the season, then something unusual will have happened. But he is 32 and in each of his first two seasons, his performances were deadened by minor issues or fatigue at critical moments.
Thomas Muller has left for Vancouver Whitecaps, Mathys Tel has completed a move to Tottenham Hotspur, and Sane has joined Galatasaray. Kane will almost certainly need support. Woltemade would have been an interesting solution. The range of positions he can play would have made him Kane's successor and backup, and, because of his playmaking qualities, an able deputy to Musiala. Instead, Bayern will seek an alternative without diminishing their resources too much.
Dayot Upamecano and Jonathan Tah are the new first-choice centre-back pairing, and, theoretically, that seems a more balanced combination than Bayern have had for some time. One proactive, the other more reactive.
There were warnings in the Supercup. Woltemade should have scored in the first half, wriggling through on goal before shooting tamely at Manuel Neuer, and a more efficient team than Stuttgart would have made more from the chances they created (1.57 expected goals).
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These are early days, though, and that partnership must be allowed time to mature and develop a proper understanding; Upamecano and Tah have never played together before this season, and gaps and miscommunication will be part of their evolution.
But Bayern's past two seasons have each been defined and limited by defensive problems. For example, the fragility that Bayer Leverkusen exposed at the BayArena in February 2024, and the Neuer fumble against Real Madrid in their Champions League semi-final.
That repeated against Inter in April, when Bayern's shaky defence was exposed across both legs of their Champions League quarter-final by the late second goal conceded at home and the two from corners in the second.
Is this new combination good enough? Upamecano had a tremendous middle third of last season and has certainly shown he can reach a high standard. But can that last? Can other players hit the same level? And, more importantly, can the defence be protected sufficiently?
Those will be underlying, unimportant issues for much of the year. Bayern are rarely examined in ways that highlight their flaws, but their seasons are judged by what they do against teams who are equipped with that kind of power, and in those moments, they will have to be much, much better.
Perhaps there is a lack of specialisation, too. For instance, while Konrad Laimer has many of the attributes required to be an excellent right-back, he is not actually a right-back. There is a difference. It is the same story on the left: Alphonso Davies is still injured and it's disconcerting that Kompany is left with imperfect replacements in his absence — Josip Stanisic seems stronger on the right, Hiroki Ito looks happier as an outside centre-back and Guerreiro is more of a utility option.
Their biggest European rivals draw strength from those areas but Bayern are too often trying to hide weaknesses within them. That dynamic will be another theme this year.
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