Despite England captain Harry Kane’s late goal at Bochum, it failed to salvage Bayern Munich from their third defeat in the span of nine days.
Bayern Munich initially seized the lead with Jamal Musiala’s goal, but the match was interrupted twice due to fans’ protests. Bochum retaliated with two goals from Takuma Asano and Keven Schlotterbeck.
A penalty from Kevin Stoger extended their lead to 3-1 after Dayot Upamecano received a red card. Despite Harry Kane’s 25th league goal of the season, Bayern fell short.
With this defeat, Thomas Tuchel’s Bayern find themselves eight points adrift of Bundesliga leaders Bayer Leverkusen. Tuchel acknowledged that clinching the Bundesliga title seems improbable, stating, “Last season we believed until the end and we were rewarded. So we will keep working at it.”
Having been German champions for the past 11 seasons, Bayern now confront the prospect of concluding the campaign without silverware.
Their earlier setbacks include defeat in the German Super Cup in August and elimination from the German Cup in November by third-tier Saarbrucken.
Tuchel’s team suffered a 3-0 defeat at Leverkusen on February 10th, followed by a 1-0 loss to Lazio in the first leg of their Champions League last-16 tie midweek.
Addressing the scrutiny surrounding him after his team’s third consecutive loss, Tuchel remarked, “The ‘how’ we played is key. The ‘how’ was good and that’s why this 90 minutes are very different from the second half at Lazio or the game at Leverkusen.”
This loss marked Bayern’s first three-match losing streak since May 2015, during Pep Guardiola’s tenure as manager.
More protests at Bundesliga games
During the first half and early in the second, play was halted for nearly 10 minutes each time due to fan protests, involving the throwing of tennis balls onto the pitch. This pattern of protests is becoming increasingly common at Bundesliga matches, with supporters expressing dissatisfaction over an investment proposal by the German Football Association.
In December, German clubs voted in favor of a proposal to sell some Bundesliga TV rights in exchange for investment capital. Since then, various forms of protest have emerged. In a recent Bundesliga 2 match between Hansa Rostock and Hamburg, remote control cars carrying smoke bombs interrupted play. In another instance, during a Borussia Dortmund match against Freiburg, fans from the Dortmund section threw tennis balls and chocolate gold coins onto the pitch, causing a 10-minute delay.
Additionally, during a Hannover game on February 9th, Hamburg fans chained six padlocks to a goal during halftime, requiring intervention to remove them before play could resume.
Kane continues to reach goalscoring landmarks
Bayern initially took the lead courtesy of Musiala’s powerful strike, but conceded twice within a five-minute span following the first of the two stoppages. Upamecano received his second yellow card and was subsequently sent off for elbowing Schlotterbeck, marking his second dismissal in just five days after his red card against Lazio. Bochum capitalized on the penalty to surge ahead 3-1.
Bundesliga’s leading goal scorer, Kane, managed to pull one back late in the game, but his team couldn’t find the equalizer. Nonetheless, he achieved a new milestone by becoming the fastest player to reach 25 Bundesliga goals in a single season, accomplishing this feat in 22 games, surpassing the previous record held by former Borussia Dortmund striker Erling Haaland.
Having joined Bayern from Tottenham for £86.4m last summer, Kane is yet to secure a major trophy in his career. Consequently, he will be banking on Bayern’s ability to narrow the gap with Leverkusen and overturn their deficit in European competition.