Bayern Munich v Inter Milan:LOUIS VAN GAAL has more than enough self-regard to remain confident even when cast as a minor character in the tale of Jose Mourinho. The Bayern Munich manager was content to recall his first encounter with the Portuguese on arrival at Barcelona 13 years ago. Any notion that Mourinho has since surpassed him will, however, be put to a stern test tonight.
There was subtlety to Van Gaal’s depiction of this Champions League final with Internazionale. The Dutchman did not shirk from classing the two sides as being below the elite of European football. “Chelsea, Barcelona and Manchester United are better but nonetheless Bayern can win the title,” he said.
There is surely an element of tactical modesty in that. Even if he is correct in his evaluation it was also a rejection of the idea that Inter are an irresistible power. Van Gaal was informed that the former Milan manager Arrigo Sacchi had said Bayern would lose to Inter if both sides were at their normal level. “Sacchi is an expert,” he said with scorn, although the Italian genuinely does have high standing.
Van Gaal is right to feel Bayern are not to be treated dismissively. Like Inter, they have lately completed the league and cup double on the domestic front. Determined efforts have been under way for a while to refurbish the club’s reputation across the continent. Ironically, they lack the very emblem of that policy in the Champions League final.
Franck Ribery, who is suspended for this match, was bought from Marseille for about €23 million in 2007 as a statement of intent that Bayern, even in a Bundesliga that prizes social values more than the reckless commercialism of other countries, still had the means to compete. As a great institution, the club, it should be acknowledged, has enviable income from, for example, sponsorship.
It is ironic that Ribery was seen as proof of Bayern’s ability to afford the very best since he has proved to be something of an underachiever. That did not stop the club from going to the limits in a bid to challenge the ban that followed his red card in the first leg of the semi-final with Lyon, but Bayern’s feats in this campaign have not had all that much to do with him. Tendinitis seemed to have taken its toll.
Mourinho will have noticed that the Bayern squad have been potent enough not to count on the Frenchman. In keeping with Van Gaal’s realistic appraisal, the side have also muddled through on occasion. Manchester United let them off the hook when a Michael Carrick mistake led to a goal from Ivica Olic at Old Trafford just when it appeared that the contest was ending in that quarter-final.
There was a grievance, too, about the overreaction from the Bayern players over the offence that brought Rafael a second yellow card, even though each booking had been merited. Van Gaal’s side have looked on occasion as if they simply scuffle through each contest, but that is a misconception and opponents have perhaps been slow to realise the threat. There have been exquisite moments from Bayern, particularly when Arjen Robben scored, both in Manchester and Florence.
In the last four Lyon seemed puny adversaries yet they had been potent enough when eliminating Real Madrid in the campaign. Evidence mounts of Bayern discovering their strengths and improving with the passing months. It has to be borne in mind that this is Van Gaal’s first season with the club. As with most people during long careers there have been bad patches for the manager, yet he is as sure as ever of his methods.
Van Gaal talks, with a tinge of self-regard, of his “specific way of training mind as well as body” and considers himself “a process manager”. He has achieved too much for this to be written off as an affectation. The 58-year-old has had to endure. He took Ajax to a Champions League triumph in 1995, but lasted an ignominiously brief six months in his second stint with Barcelona; and he could not steer the Netherlands to the 2002 World Cup.
In short, his durability has been proven. The sense of the game as an adventure is intact. “We play for the fans and the public so we have to make it very attractive,” Van Gaal said. “I think the image of Bayern has changed this season because we play in an attractive style.”
As Van Gaal well knows, it is not an assertion Mourinho can make. There will be 70,000 fans who will watch the final on a screen at Bayern’s stadium, the Allianz Arena. Van Gaal is inspiring and Mourinho should be wary of the people who have rallied to his cause.
GuardianService
Probable line-ups
Bayern Munich
22 Hans-Joerg Butt
21 Philipp Lahm
5 Daniel van Buyten
6 Martin Demichelis
26 Diego Contento
8 Hamit Altintop
17 Mark van Bommel
31 Bastian Schweinsteiger
10 Arjen Robben
11 Ivica Olic
25 Thomas Mueller
Inter Milan
12 Julio Cesar
13 Maicon
25 Walter Samuel
6 Lucio
4 Javier Zanetti
19 Esteban Cambiasso
5 Dejan Stankovic
10 Wesley Sneijder
9 Samuel Eto'o
22 Diego Milito
27 Goran Pandev
Referee: Howard Webb (England)
