Thomas Muller presents Bayern Munich’s clash against Hertha Berlin, FIFA Club World Cup

This month a hectic and busy fixture list for Bayer Munich in all competitions (Bundesliga, FIFA Club World Cup, Champions League). The first challenge of the month comes in the form of a trip to the Olympiastadion to face off against Hertha Berlin, who recently brought back Pál Dárdai after sacking Bruno Labbadia. Immediately after this match, Bayern will travel to Doha, Qatar for the FIFA Club World Cup, where they will face Egyptian team Al Ahly in the semi-finals.

In a recent interview with FCBayern.com, Thomas Muller anticipated the match in Berlin as well as the Club World Cup in Qatar. Dárdai took charge of his first game last weekend in the 3-1 loss to Eintracht Frankfurt, but Muller said it made it even harder to analyze a team that only had only one match under a new manager.

“We only had one game to analyze what they have changed and how they want to do things differently compared to the period under Bruno Labbadia. This makes the analysis a little more difficult. Nonetheless, of course, we try to prepare mainly for our game, to work through our to-do list, how we want to approach the game, ”he explained.

Berlin also acquired Sami Khedira in a free transfer from Juventus on deadline day in the winter transfer window, and he’s a player Muller has known very well from his time playing together in the German national team. Muller recalled Khedira’s years of playing in the Bundesliga for VfB Stuttgart and said it was a testament to the talent in Germany that he continued to play for clubs like Juventus and Real Madrid: “I’m glad that Sami be back. He’s a Bundesliga kid, he grew up here, he won the championship here with Stuttgart very young and he won his spurs. It was great for German football that he then moved abroad and played for top clubs like Real Madrid and Juventus. It also shows the quality of German players over the past 10 or 15 years, that they were again in demand abroad. I’m curious to see how things will turn out for him after he returns.

Bayern’s first meeting with Hertha was a 4-3 thriller at the Allianz Arena which saw Robert Lewandowski score all four of Bayern’s goals. The winner came by virtue of a late penalty converted by the Polish ace, but Bayern’s trips to the Olympiastadion in recent seasons haven’t always been too pretty, including the 2-0 loss of the 2018 season. / 2019. It is always a difficult task to win in Berlin and Muller admitted that Bayern were wary of the extra pressure on Hertha to change her fortunes and get a positive result: “Normally matches in Berlin are always a bit like a knife. Hertha is definitely not where he wants to be in the table. There is a lot of pressure on Berlin in the current situation. Of course we want to take advantage of it, and maybe they will start to feel a little nervous if things aren’t going well for them and maybe we can get to the first goal. We hope this will be of benefit to us. But basically I expect a Berlin team ready to fight.

Photo by Soeren Stache / via photo alliance.

Looking forward to the trip to Qatar, Muller expressed his excitement over the opportunity to get another piece of silver tied to the trebled 2019/2020 season, even though the competition takes place in 2021 due to its carryover of coronavirus. The schedule and schedule are a bit off due to the global pandemic, but Muller said that would be the perfect cap for what has been an incredible 2019/20 season: “The tournament is an opportunity for us to wrap up this huge streak of success that we had with the Champions League victory last summer. We want to crown this exceptional year by winning the Club World Cup, so we are very ambitious about this trophy. This tournament brings together the best teams from each continental association. As a European team, we are certainly favorites. We want to highlight that and win the trophy as well, but it will definitely be a challenge.

Muller also reflected on his 2013 Club World Cup victory in Morocco when Bayern beat Raja Casablanca in the final to win the title. He recalled how excited the fans were to see Bayern, but it’s obviously going to be a little different this time around due to the circumstances. “It was a wonderful time just before Christmas in Marrakech and also a very big event with the spectators there. The Moroccans were really looking forward to the tournament. Now, of course, the conditions are a bit different due to the coronavirus pandemic. The tournament was squeezed into this tight matchlist. But we have a great team that can handle it.

Photo by Lars Baron / Bongarts /.

–