Gab Marcotti reacts to the comments made by Bayern interim manager Willy Sagnol about the club's stature in Germany. With Franck Ribery set for a spell on the sidelines, Craig Burley assesses how it will affect his career moving forward.
If Bayern Munich were so unhappy with Carlo Ancelotti at the end of last season, why didn't they pull the trigger there and then? The answer is because they had a succession plan in place. They would persist with him, despite all the misgivings, in the hope that the squad's quality and some additional measures -- such as the appointments of assistant coach Willy Sagnol and sporting director Hassan Salihamidzic -- would continue to produce acceptable results. The necessary overhaul of the squad in the summer of 2018 would then coincide with the appointment of a younger, more innovative coach: Julian Nagelsmann.
Ancelotti knew that he would not see out his three-year contract, that the Bavarians didn't trust him to build a new team of talents and prospective stars. His cold treatment of Kingsley Coman, Joshua Kimmich and Renato Sanches -- who all saw limited game-time in 2016-17 because Ancelotti favoured players who were "ready for the first team," as he put it -- had made it clear that he was not interested in developing players.
By the time Bayern were humiliated by Paris Saint-Germain a week ago, Ancelotti seemed to have stopped caring about things altogether. Even his greatest backer on the board, Executive Chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, felt that the club had no option but to let the 58-year-old go straight away. His loss of authority and the team's confusion on the pitch had become too great to put up with any longer.
So, enter Nagelsmann? Alas, it's not that easy. Bayern (or to be more precise, president Uli Hoeness, his champion on the board) had earmarked the 30-year-old for July 2018, not October 2017. Hoeness was playing for time. He wanted to make sure that the self-professed Bayern supporter would gather more experience with TSG Hoffenheim 1899 during his first season in Europe, only the second full campaign of his career.
If Nagelsmann found a semblance of success in the spotlight or led Hoffenheim back into European football again at the end of 2017-18, it would have been easier to "sell" the novice to the star-studded dressing room, the supporters and most importantly, to Rummenigge. The former world-class striker has reservations about Nagelsmann's suitability after such a short time in the coaching business.
Under the unspoken rules of the delicate power-sharing agreement between the two "alpha males" at Säbener Strasse, it would now be Hoeness' turn to get his wish on the bench, as Ancelotti had been very much Rummenigge's appointment. But the the fall-out of the debacle in Paris has put that natural order into question.
Rummenigge, left, and Hoeness have different visions for Bayern's future. Reconciliation will be essential.
Nagelsmann's inexperience has strengthened the case for Thomas Tuchel, who has already coached at a top club, won a trophy, undoubtedly plays the kind of tactically astute football that Bayern crave in their bid to get closer to Europe's elite and, of course, is available straight away. The 44-year-old, who fell out with some players and the Borussia Dortmund board at the end of his two-year-tenure because of his perfectionist streak, would uneasily fit into Hoeness' vision of Bayern as a bastion of togetherness and shared values. But Rummenigge, a much more pragmatic and emotionally detached operator, isn't overly concerned by that side of things. It is no secret that Tuchel would be his choice.
The 2-2 draw under interim coach Sagnol at Hertha has taken away "wait and see" as a viable third option. Therefore, they're left with two candidates and a club pulling in two directions at once.
Logic would dictate that Bayern will eventually settle on Tuchel as the slightly less risky candidate for the immediate future, a solution which would still leave Hoeness' favourite, Nagelsmann, as a back-up in case it doesn't work out under the very demanding former Dortmund coach. But irrespective of the man on the bench, the past few days have shown that Bayern's leadership crisis is worse than anticipated. As long there's no unity of purpose at the boardroom level, the next coach and his team will continue to struggle.
Raphael Honigstein is ESPN FC's German football expert. Follow: @honigstein
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Source: espn.co.uk