There are basic conventions when it comes to managing not just a football club, but any type of sports team; heck, any kind of business. That is, when you choose to fire the guy in charge, you are stripping him of responsibility and handing the reins to someone else, even if only temporarily. Bayern Munich, announcing that Thomas Tuchel will leave at the end of the 2023-24 season, simply drove a fleet of Audis past them.
The decision to leave Tuchel is not surprising. He has led this team to within eight points of Bayer Leverkusen in the race for the Bundesliga title, he has had clashes with veteran players, he did not please the numerous comments from former Bayern stars turned media announcers, he lost three games. constantly, including the first leg of the round of 16 against Lazio in the Champions League, and his team has generally played impressive football. Which, after almost a year in charge and following the signing of Harry Kane for €95 million ($102.6 million) in the summer, is hugely disappointing.
What's surprising (or contradictory, if you want to give Bayern the benefit of the doubt, or insane, if you don't) is announcing to the world that you're done with him. and Still, he will stay until the end of the campaign. Bayern are effectively saying that Tuchel is part of the problem (and, implicitly, not part of the solution) and yet they want him to stay and coach this group of men for the rest of the year.
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How is it supposed to work? If Tuchel couldn't get players to listen to him and act when he was the big boss with a contract until June 2025, how is he supposed to do it now that everyone knows his days are numbered? If the club's leaders no longer believe in him, what makes you think that the players will?
It's a recipe for lame duck soup, and although you could swallow it if the season ended with nothing to play for, Bayern are not in that situation at the moment. Yes, they were bad against Lazio in the Champions League, but this is Lazio, who are eighth in Serie A for a reason: reversing that 1-0 deficit on the road doesn't seem like a big effort. And yes, the gap with Bayer Leverkusen is large, but not insurmountable with 12 games remaining.
Furthermore, the gap is largely large not because Bayern have not gained points at a sufficient rate (they are on track for 77, which is the average of Bundesliga winners over the last five seasons) but rather because Leverkusen have state road grading to everyone in sight. (Xabi Alonso's team is on track to reach 90 points, which would be just one away from the record). It is not unreasonable to expect some regression to the mean from Leverkusen, given that this is a team with an inexperienced coach in charge of a club. who have never won the league and whose last (well, only) trophy dates back to the early 1990s.
Do not misunderstand. I don't expect Bayer Leverkusen to collapse and Bayern win their twelfth consecutive Bundesliga title, but the slim chances that existed are surely slimmer now.
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Marcotti: “Tuchel has become the latest duck out of Bayern Munich”
Gab Marcotti reacts to the news that Thomas Tuchel will leave Bayern Munich at the end of the season and asks if this decision could harm the club this season.
Bayern have shown over the years that they are comfortable firing coaches mid-stream. In fact, four of their last five permanent coaches (Carlo Ancelotti, Niko Kovac, Julian Nagelsmann and now Tuchel) were sacked during the campaign… and Bayern still won the league. (That probably says more about the Bundesliga and the imbalance of resources than anything else.) But in each of those cases, once the decision was made, the coach was out of there, sometimes with a permanent replacement, sometimes with an interim boss. .
It's a cliché, but there is clearly some validity to the idea of freshening things up, giving the team a shake-up or even just turning up to training and being confronted by someone other than Tuchel, his nerves and baggage frayed. Instead, Bayern's players will get more of the same, albeit with (inevitably) less authority, since they know they are listening to a guy who won't be around in a few months because his employer doesn't think he's the right guy for lead them.
Logic, huh?
What good can come of this? Even the best case scenario (imagine (it's hard to do, I know) that there is a strange cosmic lineup, the plan works and Tuchel takes Bayern to the Champions League and/or the Bundesliga crown) will boomerang against they. . If that happens, they will look foolish for sacking Tuchel, which will only further undermine their credibility.
The club will now press the reset button and begin the process of searching for a new manager for 2024-25. “A new direction in football,” is what the club's general manager, Jan-Christian Dreesen, who is fluent in business language, called it. Meanwhile, they will continue in the “old football direction”, only with less enthusiasm and faith than before.
