Eintracht Frankfurt 5-1 Bayern Munich: 5 talking points as the Bavarians suffer a humiliating defeat | Bundesliga 2019-20

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Frankfurt did plenty right against Bayern Munich
Frankfurt did plenty right against Bayern Munich

When the scoreline reads 5-1, you usually assume that Bayern Munich's on the winning end of that scoreline. Eintracht Frankfurt handed the defending champions a humiliating defeat after they went down to 10-men with Jerome Boateng after just 9 minutes.

With Bayern playing catch-up for most of the 90 minutes against Niko Kovac's former side, Frankfurt didn't take long to go ahead and double their lead through Filip Kostic and Djibril Sow. Although the scoring machine Robert Lewandowski would pull one back for the visitor and Bayern would continue to create in spurts, the home team never looked out of control.

Things went from bad to worse for Bayern Munich early in the second half as captain David Abraham got on the scoresheet to restore Frankfurt's lead. A patient Eintracht saw out plenty of Bayern attacks and created chances of their own and the goals from Hinteregger and Goncalo Paciencia were just icing on a wonderful win for the hosts.


#5 Bayern between the devil and the deep blue sea

Jerome Boateng's sending off came on VAR's advice
Jerome Boateng's sending off came on VAR's advice

The first 10 minutes were even between the two teams with both sides showing some attacking threat. The biggest twist of the game was to come early in this tie though, Jerome Boateng's sending off in the 9th minute of the game put the game firmly in Eintracht's grasp.

The decision made by the referee early on was actually a penalty to the home team and a yellow for Boateng owing to the double jeopardy rules. A decision not really in Bayern's favour but one they may have chosen given the alternative.

VAR pulled it back and asked the referee to review the decision because the contact Boateng made with Goncalo Paciencia was outside the box and the official changed his decision to a freekick and sent off Boateng as the last man in Bayern's defence.

#4 Calm Eintracht Frankfurt

Frankfurt stuck to their gameplan
Frankfurt stuck to their gameplan

Adi Hutter's Eintracht Frankfurt came into the game with a game plan and troubled Bayern Munich early on. With the early sending off, many teams may have been tempted to throw everything at Bayern early on in the hope of getting something out of the game quickly or leave it too late while trying to keep the opposition at bay.

Frankfurt just stuck to their gameplan and continued to trouble Bayern Munich at the back. The defending champions who were also trying to make the best of their situation by keeping the ball and creating chances left a few gaps open at the back for Frankfurt to exploit.

A tricky fixture for the visitors swung heavily in Frankfurt's favour when Kostic opened the scoring but the hosts weren't able to let up. Even after Bayern clawed a goal back, Eintracht looked like they were in control of the tie.

#3 Unstoppable Robert Lewandowski; impressive Manuel Neuer

Lewandowski's scoring run goes on despite a poor result
Lewandowski's scoring run goes on despite a poor result

He's now scored 14 goals in 10 games for Bayern Munich in an incredible 10-game scoring run for the Bavarians; Robert Lewandowski has been the pure definition of unstoppable in Bayern's attack. The Polish forward received the ball under pressure, selling Hinteregger a dummy with a slight feint and beating him, holding off Abraham and slotting it past the goalkeeper to get his customary goal in a poor performance from his team.

At the other end, Manuel Neuer pulled off some absolute blinders to keep the score from becoming more embarrassing. At one point, it seemed to be a one-on-one battle between him and Filip Kostic and the custodian won that personal battle on many occasions earning himself more respect from the fans.

Had Lewandowski scored a couple of the other chances, or Neuer made more saves, it might've been a different game for Bayern, but they had bigger problems on the day.

#2 Filip Kostic made the extra man count

Kostic was instrumental in Frankfurt's dismantling of Bayern
Kostic was instrumental in Frankfurt's dismantling of Bayern

What do you do when you have a man advantage for over 80 minutes in a game? The best bet would be to stretch the opposition and find spaces in between them, which is exactly what Frankfurt did to perfection for most of the game.

Instrumental in that tactic was Filip Kostic whose fortunate strike kicked off the night's scoring. He exposed Muller's lack of defensive nous and isolated Joshua Kimmich while combining with his team-mates and dictating play. The Serbian's ability to take players on as well as play some lovely passing football at times completely baffled a makeshift Bayern Munich defence.

Djibril Sow and Danny Da Costa were also instrumental at the other end putting in dangerous balls for the Bayern back four to deal with. Towards the end as the visitors tired, Frankfurt didn't let up and made sure of the points.

#1 Puzzling lack of activity from Niko Kovac

A fatal error from Niko Kovac not to act may have cost Bayern
A fatal error from Niko Kovac not to act may have cost Bayern

Having a man sent off so early in the game usually means a reshuffle for any side. Even more so when you have a centre-back sent off. It seemed fairly straightforward that Benjamin Pavard would go into the centre-back pairing with David Alaba and Kimmich would resume duties on the right. However, the entire reason for putting Kimmich in midfield was to add some steel in the middle alongside Thiago.

With Kimmich moving to right-back, Thiago was left to cope alone in midfield behind Thomas Muller, Serge Gnabry and Philippe Coutinho. Despite Lewandowski coming deep to help out on many instances, Bayern failed more often than not to create much playing through the middle.

Kovac could've added Javi Martinez to the mix earlier to provide a base from which to work, but he chose to act (or not to act) with an arrogance that Bayern could potentially outscore their opposition even with one player fewer than the opposition. A decision that played a big role in a humbling defeat.

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Edited by Zaid Khan
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