Eight months ago, Bayern Munich found themselves teetering on the edge of a crisis that few could have predicted.
The Bundesliga crown, typically their birthright, had slipped through their grasp. In Europe, the Bavarians fell short once again, eliminated by Real Madrid in the UEFA Champions League semifinals. Behind closed doors, the club's usually steady foundations were anything but as internal tensions simmered at Säbener Strasse, casting long shadows over the summer ahead.
The club's higher-ups had realised that the move to hire Thomas Tuchel as a replacement for Julian Nagelsmann had failed. Meanwhile, Nagelsmann was polishing his reputation with the wider German public, becoming a fairly successful and popular manager of the national team. On top of that, Bayern's own coaching search turned into a public-relations nightmare, with media outlets from Germany and beyond reporting about the long list of coaching candidates who had all declined to join the club.
In the end, Bayern appointed Vincent Kompany, an unlikely solution given that the former Hamburg defender did not come close to staving off relegation from the Premier League with Burnley. Serious questions regarding his inexperience and overall track record as a manager were raised. However, only a few weeks after the 38-year-old's arrival, those inside the club were beginning to praise Kompany's management style. They repeatedly stressed the fact that for the first time in a long time, the club did not seem in a state of unrest.
Kompany and sporting director Max Eberl, who had been a proponent of the former Belgium international before he was hired, get along quite well. Meanwhile, many inside the dressing room seemingly realised that dissent played a part in their failures during the 2023-24 season.
Even players who weren't necessarily happy with their role in the beginning of the season -- such as Leon Goretzka, who started the campaign on the bench -- did not voice their displeasure publicly. What certainly has helped is the fact that Kompany goes out of his way to praise his charges and stress their importance when asked about them by members of the media. He doesn't make statements that leave room for interpretation.
Now that the calendar has turned to 2025, nothing has changed. Kompany is widely respected and steers the ship like he has been in the job for years. The tall, broad-shouldered Belgian exudes an almost Carlo Ancelotti-like poise in how he approaches his team and the media.
There were certainly moment when things could have turned. There was the one-sided loss to Barcelona in the Champions League in October, and three of the Bavarians' final six matches of 2024 resulted in dropped points to Borussia Dortmund, a DFB-Pokal exit at the hands of Bayer Leverkusen and a Bundesliga defeat to Mainz.
Despite those results, everyone inside the facility remained calm, knowing that the club needed to show much more patience than in recent times.
The decision to sack Nagelsmann in March 2023 may have been a valuable lesson because, in the aftermath, many inside the club acknowledged that Bayern moved on far too early from a promising young coach. What's more, the fact that Bayern were turned down by several managers before hiring Kompany can partly be attributed to their previous hire-and-fire mentality. They need to stick with the Belgian, especially when he and his assistants have shown signs of progress with the team.
Multiple sources who spoke to ESPN emphasised that "Vinny," as some call him, does a tremendous job of fostering a positive dressing room culture. Instead of criticising players in news conferences or post-game interviews, Kompany is addressing anything of relevance inside the dressing room, which may also have contributed to the decline in leaks to the media. In the recent past, practically any heated argument between the manager and players would find its way into the notebooks of well-connected journalists in Munich and elsewhere in Germany. Not this season.
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| Vincent Kompany has restored a sense of calm to Bayern Munich following the turbulence the club has experienced in recent years. Tom Weller/picture alliance via Getty Images |
Things came to a head during Tuchel's tenure, when the manager's disagreement with Joshua Kimmich became public. One source specifically told ESPN that players appreciate Kompany's preference for keeping things in-house.
For example, he easily could have put the blame on Manuel Neuer when the veteran goalkeeper was shown a red card in the DFB-Pokal match against Leverkusen last month, a mistake that essentially cost Bayern one trophy this season. Instead, Kompany simply said that his goalkeeper "made a decision. It was close. That's football, and this is part of it."
Returning exciting football to Bayern
Those who have been following Bayern closely may find the current feel-good environment suspicious, because even in times when the club won one trophy after another, there were usually a few conflicts involving players, coaches and boardroom figures. Success helps mitigate tension, though.
Following the loss to Barcelona in the Champions League on Oct. 23, Bayern won seven games in a row without conceding a goal. There's visible progress that might lead to Bayern reaching peak form in March, April and May -- when trophies are usually won.
"I like the high press," Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, the former chairman of the executive board of Bayern, said in October. "It reminds me of the times under Jupp Heynckes, Pep Guardiola, Carlo Ancelotti or Hansi Flick when we celebrated this type of fun football. That's why I believe it is important that we have found our way back to it. Our football has not only become more appealing, but you can also feel the excitement of the spectators in the stadium."
Kompany is becoming a respected coaching figure almost overnight. It had been known before he joined Bayern that the former Belgium international was a disciple of Guardiola's brand of football, having played under the Catalan at Manchester City between 2016 and 2019.
"Eberl asked me to talk to [Guardiola] as I am close friends with Pep," Rummenigge said. "I told Pep I needed an authentic and honest analysis. We then were talking on the phone for almost two hours. To make a long story short, he said that he was 100% convinced that Vincent Kompany would be the absolutely perfect coach for Bayern."
Kompany already showed that he could be a competent possession coach during his time as Anderlecht's manager and his first year at Burnley. However, coaching Bayern poses a different set of challenges, and yet, he didn't hesitate to let his team play an overly aggressive style with a high back line from the start.
Bayern only made three major signings during the summer: Michael Olise, Hiroki Ito and João Palhinha. Other than these three and Josip Stanisic, who returned from a loan spell at Bayer Leverkusen, this is the same team that crumbled during the second half of 2023-24.
Sources suggest that Kompany is quite deliberate in how he coaches and teaches his players individually. He approaches with very specific advice in relation to their position and tactical role in his system. Positioning in build-up or the direction and timing of runs into the final third are only a few of the things that are addressed by Kompany and his assistants, who seem to work very hard to analyse all the little details to refine Bayern's tactical system. During the November international break, Kompany once again decided to let his players who had not been selected by their respective national teams train individually instead of in a group setting.
Two who have benefited from Kompany's different approach in terms of communication and coaching are centre-backs Dayot Upamecano and Kim Min-Jae. Often the focal point of criticism last season, both have stepped up their game significantly. Their manager's pedigree as a former world-class centre-back certainly provides an advantage.
For Upamecano and Kim, missteps are treated as opportunities rather than failures, a marked departure from the approach of Kompany's predecessor. The transformation in both players over just a few months speaks volumes, with their newfound confidence on the pitch a testament to the manager's nuanced understanding of player development and man-management.
Managing the spring schedule and beyond
The first five months of the Kompany era established a trend in which Bayern have not fared well in games against the strongest opposition, both domestically and abroad. In order to turn that around in the second half of the season, Kompany has to make his team's attacking structure more flexible.
In the closing months of 2024, Bayern often attempted the same sequence of plays -- involving Kimmich as anchor in the middle, Alphonso Davies in the left half-space and Kingsley Coman as the winger on the left side -- over and over again. In general, Bayern still tend to move the ball toward the touchlines frequently, which makes them too predictable against highly competent defences.
As such, there is still much to be done before Bayern can be the force of a couple of years ago. Kompany can only hope that nothing disrupts his work in any meaningful way.
He might not appreciate it when Uli Hoeness, Bayern's former president, suggests the club will enjoy an easy campaign, saying, "We can lean back again after a long time. Other clubs have worries." That statement was countered by Eberl, who stressed that every opponent "can be dangerous to us." Eberl was proven right when Bayern lost their first league game of the season in mid-December against Mainz.
Besides the potential noise coming out of the board rooms, there is also the uncertain future of a few key players that could create tension. Bayern hope to agree fresh contracts with Davies, Kimmich and Jamal Musiala. While negotiations with Davies have been received positively by the club's higher-ups, talks with both Kimmich and Musiala are seemingly more difficult, yet the Bavarians remain optimistic that both will eventually sign new deals.
The expectation is that Musiala sees himself playing for Bayern for many years to come. Once a new contract is finalised, he will very likely become the highest earner alongside Harry Kane, cementing the notion that the 21-year-old is the player Bayern intend to build their future team around.
Like Davies', Kimmich's contract expires at the end of the season. Bayern were ready to cut ties last summer but kept Kimmich because he refused to agree a transfer elsewhere. The club have changed their stance and would be willing to extend Kimmich's terms, and a final decision ought to be made very soon. Kompany himself has emphasised that he hopes Kimmich will extend his stay at the club.
"Joshua has played every minute thus far, so the answer is easy. He has shown in every game that he is important to us," Kompany said when asked about the negotiations between Bayern and Kimmich.
The situation of Goretzka, though, could prove to be instructive. The 29-year-old, whose first start this season didn't come until Nov. 9, has told the club that he intends to remain beyond January despite interest from various clubs.
Even more difficult could become the topic of Leroy Sané's future. The winger never fulfilled the expectations that arose when he moved from Manchester City in 2020. Since his contract expires at the end of the season, the Germany international's departure appears to be the most likely outcome. It would free up a spot on the wings for Athletic Club's Nico Williams or Dortmund's Jamie Gittens, who are both on Bayern's list of potential transfer targets for next summer.
However, parting ways with a few prominent players and remaining unsure about the future of veteran players, most notably Kimmich and Thomas Müller, who may or may not retire come June, could be challenging to Kompany in a completely different way. He has so far reacted to questions about players and personnel decisions like an experienced diplomat, yet if some respected players become disgruntled about their situations, it will be much more difficult to keep the ship steady.
Despite his limited managerial experience, Kompany has been part of the football scene for decades. He knows all too well how fragile harmony and momentum are in this sport. So far, he's struck the right balance to achieve both.
- Constantin Eckner
