Bounce Back in Heidenheim | OneFootball

The past week has been a tough one to swallow for Bayern supporters. First the home loss to Inter Milan in the Champions League. Then the home draw with BVB when they had a chance to increase their lead in the league. Then their elimination in the UCL on Wednesday as they were unable to overcome the injuries and mistakes to force overtime or win.

Now there is one title left and all focus must shift to it. Bayern headed into their match Saturday with a six point lead and the chance to put more pressure on Leverkusen. Kompany changed the lineup quite a bit opting for Jonas Urbig, Raphael Guerriero, Josip Stanisic, Eric Dier, Konrad Lahmer, Aleksander Pavlovic, Joshua Kimmich, Kingsley Coman, Serge Gnabry, Michael Olise and Harry Kane.

In truth, this match was over very quickly as Kane scored in the 12th minute and Laimer added a second just seven minutes later before Coman made it three just before halftime. The second half was much less interesting as neither side scored after Kimmich’s 56th minute goal to make it 4-0.

Three Things We Noticed

Clean Sheet

Urbig finally earned himself a clean sheet for the first time in a Bayern jersey. To be fair this was hardly his fault but it was good for both the defense and Urbig to keep someone off the scoresheet.

It’s been a rocky and tough road for the defense with all the injuries and Urbig has certainly shown signs that Bayern is correct in placing their trust in him to be Bayern’s number one for years to come.

However, the defense also heavily contributed to this clean sheet and it was certainly needed for them to build some confidence given recent form. Hopefully that will have given them a bit of a confidence boost as we head in the last four matches of the season.

Wasted Chances

Bayern were good today. To be fair, Heidenheim also was not very good, however this was a good win and overall performance for the Bavarians.

With that said however, it has to be noted that Bayern could have and probably should have scored seven or even eight goals. Kane missed multiple open shots from short range and in fact, most of the attackers had such a moment, especially in a dominant first half performance.

While they did put four past Heidenheim, this has been a pervasive problem towards the end of the season and is something that everyone needs to work on. They won’t always create as many chances as they’d do this week and if they misse as many as they did today, they could let Leverkusen back into the title race.

Big Win

With all of that being said, it was still a very important win for Bayern. They now only really need two wins out of four to clinch the league, a feat that should certainly be manageable.

Bayern will certainly have earned this trophy as well. Leverkusen’s poor start to the season helped Bayern to get a big lead over their rivals and Bayern’s injuries and poor finish have helped Leverkusen to get back in it.

But given their recent struggles and the obvious need for a win to stave off Leverkusen, this was a solid performance. They now have a nine point lead which puts pressure on Leverkusen to win tomorrow at St. Pauli.

Even assuming Leverkusen wins that match, they for sure have an uphill climb if they are going to win the Bundesliga this season. Bayern would essentially have to completely collapse for it to happen.