With the midweek aggregate win over Aresenal FC this last Wednesday, FC Bayern squeaked its way into the UEFA Champions League final 8 with a dominant performance in London and a showcase in shoddy finishing on Wednesday. With the draw today we now know the path to UEFA Champions League trophy lies through Juventus.

At this point in the year, fatigue begins to take its toll on players and the all important question of squad rotation and management comes to the forefront. In the last 3 weeks, Bayern have played a game every 3 days between the Bundesliga, Champions League, and the Pokal. With the international break and 2 World Cup qualifiers looming in the next 2 weeks, many of Bayern's players will not be rested going into the early April's fixture congestion again. Heading into the start of April, Bayern will play 7 games in the first 21 days over 3 competitions.

However, one of these competitions is almost in the bag, as the Bundesliga magic number sits at 7.

7 points either won by Bayern or lost by Dortmund. Theoretically, by this time tomorrow Bayern could 1 point away from clinching the Bundesliga title.

The importance of this cannot be understated as this underscores the fact that the rest of this season, starting in April, should absolutely be focused on the development of both Xherdan Shaqiri and Emre Can along with handing Thomas Muller and Toni Kroos the keys. As Phil has enumerated, on Wednesday Kroos and Muller were handed the keys to the car and while they didn't wreck, they certainly took some paint off the side. As the future of this team at the ripe young ages of 23 and 24 respectively, this along with the development of the Robben heir apparent Xherdan Shaqiri and defensive midfielder Emre Can should be a priority focus in the last half of the season in league play. Looking into the future, Emre Can should be a very important piece in defensive midfield depth with the age of Anatoliy Tymoschuck and the looming end of his contract. As astoundingly good as both Robben and Ribery are, they are both injury prone and aging and this proper future depth development is needed. The fixture congestion looming on the horizon as well as our current standing in the Bundesliga begs that this be the path that the team takes forward into the close of the 2012-2013 season.

The question then becomes, whats worth more to Bayern and its fans as we have the opportunity to set records in most games won, most clean sheets, as well as lowest goals allowed in a single Bundesliga campaign. Should we potentially forego these goals and focus on the first team development of some of the best young talent in Europe or take a stab at setting nigh unapproachable Bundelsiga records?