It is common wisdom that football is a day-to-day business. But for the most part it’s true. On the transfer market, as with changing coaches, decisions are made within a few hours or even minutes. The entertainment business of football, which turns millions in revenue, often works like the actual football on the pitch: it’s unpredictable, spontaneous, and violent (or gorgeously beautiful, depending).
From this point of view, the dismissal of Bayern coach Julian Nagelsmann was a standard procedure, as it happens again and again in football. The reasons for his dismissal are understandable. The team’s performances were extremely inconsistent in the Bundesliga. The coach Nagelsmann would probably have had good chances of not being the first Bayern coach in eleven years to win a championship title. Bayern have lost ten points to Borussia Dortmund since the beginning of the year and lost their lead in the table to their rivals. That’s remarkably weak.
It is understandable that the negative development caused great concern for CEO Oliver Kahn and sports director Hasan Salihamidzic. Even the team’s impressive performances in the Champions League could not put this concern aside. Why should you trust Nagelsmann that the team will be as strong against their next opponent Manchester City and possibly Real Madrid as they were against Paris Saint-Germain? The Bayern bosses had – rightly – lost their trust in their most important employees.
Nevertheless, the rough coaching rotation does not make the leadership of Bayern, and especially Salihamidzic, look good. The image she gave to the outside world seemed rather haphazard. The question remains whether Bayern would have fired Nagelsmann if Tuchel had not happened to be on the market. Probably not. Until the defeat against Bayer Leverkusen on the Saturday before last, Nagelsmann was considered a “long-term project”. Suddenly everything was completely different and Nagelsmann was shown the door. The “long-term project” became a short-term object without a happy ending within 48 hours (from the defeat on Sunday to the call to Tuchel on Tuesday).
The sporting difficulties of the team have been visible since the second half of the past season at the latest. Robert Lewandowski recognized this early on and criticized it. This gave the Polish superstar even better reasons to say goodbye to FC Barcelona.
For Salihamidzic, this means that the supervisory board, on which Uli Hoeneß still sits, will eye him more critically. Nagelsmann was a Salihamidzic project, for which the manager transferred around 20 million euros to RB Leipzig a year and a half ago as a transfer fee and equipped the hopeful with a lavish five-year contract. That’s going to cost Bayern dearly. Maybe those were the reasons why Salihamidzic, contrary to his own beliefs, stuck with Nagelsmann for longer despite the problems on and off the pitch. He probably hoped until the very end that “his” coach would get the hang of it.
Now the Bayern leadership is putting everything on the Tuchel card, who best wins all three titles. Or none. Then it should be uncomfortable for Salihamidzic. The Bavarians also fire their managers, regardless of the losses, if need be.
