Kompany sends PSG coach Luis Enrique to school

Von Christian Stüwe

It wasn’t long ago that FC Bayern Munich’s defense and coach Vincent Kompany’s defensive approach were heavily criticized.

The Belgian had his central defenders Minjae Kim and Dayot Upamecano defend very high and in a man-oriented manner. In the 0-1 defeat at Aston Villa, in the 3-3 at Eintracht Frankfurt and in the bitter 1-4 defeat at FC Barcelona, ​​Bayern were countered, and the defensive duo did not cut a good figure time and time again.

The criticism was fierce, but Kompany stayed true to his line. He continued to trust Kim and Upamecano, who were counted in the media, and he continued to defend them highly. Successfully. A lot has happened in the month that has passed since the defeat in Barcelona.

FC Bayern celebrated seven wins across all competitions and kept seven clean sheets. The record champions’ defense last achieved something like this 13 years ago – under Jupp Heynckes in 2011.

These impressive statistics are primarily thanks to Vincent Kompany. The young coach kept calm in his first season in Munich and let the criticism bounce off him.

Kim and Upamecano repay trust

He stood in front of his defenders and remained true to his courageous, defensive approach. Now Kim and Upamecano are paying him back with excellent performances for weeks.

The South Korean even became the offensive match winner with his winning goal in the 1-0 win against Paris Saint-Germain; “Brother Leichtfuß (ret.) Upamecano was also involved in the creation of the goal.

Above all, however, the two once again left nothing to chance in their core business; once again FC Bayern had a clean sheet in this groundbreaking game.

Vincent Kompany does it better than Luis Enrique

A cross-comparison with Luis Enrique, who is 16 years older, shows how well the 38-year-old Bayern coach drives with his line. The experienced PSG coach unnecessarily opened up a construction site in the middle of the season by putting regular goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma, who had recently been criticized for a few mistakes, on the bench and putting Matvei Safonov in goal.

The fact that Safonov played a major role in the defeat with a major mistake before Kim’s goal is now likely to cause even more unrest. Especially since PSG is about to be eliminated from the Champions League. The fact that Enrique has been without the French national player and 95 million euro striker Kolo Muani for a long time is causing further discussions in Paris.

While Enrique makes himself vulnerable, Vincent Kompany is firmly in the saddle. The Belgian calmly stabilized his defense and demonstrated his skills. While the defense was shaky in October, it passed its baptism of fire just in time for the start of the “Weeks of Truth”.

The CL clash against PSG is now followed by the prestigious away game at Borussia Dortmund (Saturday at 6:30 p.m. in ran-Live ticker). This is followed by the showdown in the DFB Cup against Bayer Leverkusen.

If there were still doubts about the absolute suitability of the defense before the game against PSG because the opponents simply did not have the offensive quality in recent weeks to seriously challenge Bayern, Upamecano and Kim are beyond any doubt, at least for the time being.

And that is particularly a credit to Kompany, who used a steady hand instead of activism when the critical voices became louder and provided illustrations for other coaches – especially Luis Enrique that evening in Munich.