At FC Bayern things are going haywire in the crucial weeks of the season. Before the second leg in the Champions League against Manchester City, the unrest on Säbener Straße after the Sadio Mané incident is palpable. However, Pep Guardiola does not believe that the recent events will inhibit Munich – on the contrary.
“Sometimes it takes a conflict for the team to come closer together. I’m convinced of that,” said the Catalan ahead of his team’s second leg against Bayern Munich. For this reason, he does not consider the Sadio Mané incident to be a weak point. “It will become a strength for them,” Guardiola believes that Munich will come out of the conflict with renewed energy.
“If it were the other way around, we lost the first leg 3-0, didn’t win after that and then there was a conflict, the team would say: This is a final for us. We know exactly what we have to do and will do the same,” said the former Bayern coach, explaining how he saw the record champions’ situation.
Even superstar Kevin De Bruyne does not believe that Mané’s blow against Leroy Sané will have a lasting effect on the Munich team. “Something like that often happens. When people work together every day, they argue. That happens (…), that’s football. I’ve seen it in my career and it’s not a problem,” said the Belgian.
Even if Bayern actually emerge stronger from the situation surrounding Mané, progress in the Champions League seems almost impossible. After all, the record champions’ team showed unexpected weaknesses even before the incident. The result of this was, among other things, the early knockout of the cup against SC Freiburg.
