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Bayern Munich midfielder Viviane Asseyi made the move from France to Germany in 2020 — which everyone knows was absolutely one of the craziest years in modern history.
Still, Asseyi made an immediate impact on the pitch for Bayern Munich, but ultimately suffered an ankle injury that broke up what was a strong campaign. Asseyi is back stronger than ever and sat down with BFW to talk about her squad, this season, and her career.
Entering the 2021/22 season, Bayern Munich’s Viviane Asseyi is focused on helping her squad attain even higher levels of success than its wildly successful 2020/21 campaign.
Asseyi is not overlooking the competition in The Women's Cup but is keenly aware that the results are less important than the growth and experience that the team will gain against top-flight clubs like Paris Saint-Germain, Chicago Red Stars, and Racing Louisville.
“I’m someone who’s looking at only me and my team, because we have a lot of work to do. And yes, of course, we will play against big teams, but I think the first (priority) is on us. We need to work on us before (we focus) on the other team,” said Asseyi.
Bayern Munich, of course, edged PSG on penalty kicks during Wednesday’s semifinal. The Frauen will now move on to the championship game on Saturday against Racing Louisville, who also advanced on penalties.
Regardless, Asseyi wants to play a big role for Bayern Munich this season. Mostly, though, she wants to help the squad win every possible title that it can.
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“We won the (Bundesliga) championship, so I was happy. I want this year to be a complete year and give my best to the team,” Asseyi said. “Everybody on this team has big talent. That’s why I’m so proud to be here; because I think with this team, this year, even better things can come for us. But yeah, we know that you can have a big team, you can have all of the best players, but if you don’t work together and don’t win the the games, then you have nothing. I’m happy to have this team, because it’s really competitive. I hope we have a good season and at the end that we will be happy.”
Asseyi, who played extensively for Rouen, Montpellier, Marseille, and Bordeaux before moving to Bayern Munich has seen the women’s game explode. Asseyi recognizes that there is no specific power base any longer and that the world’s best players are establishing themselves in numerous countries for the club game.
“Now, I think there’s a lot of teams that can beat anyone. It’s better because it shows that every team is working for a women’s football, and all the clubs are doing something for women’s football,” Asseyi said. “Yeah, it will be interesting now, but I think it can be better and better. For the moment, it’s really very good because there’s a lot of competition between us, and it’s not like before that we know Lyon was really better than all the teams. Now, everybody is better, and we cannot know who will win everything. So that’s cool.”
Asseyi, who is a very popular player on the Frauen, recently did come under some fire, however, for her locker room DJ skills. Some of Asseyi’s teammates were critical of her ability to hold the “Team DJ” title any longer, now that Jovana Damnjanović has returned from her knee injury.
In fact, some teammates even inferred Asseyi is too busy on her phone texting to hold such an important position in the locker room.
“I’m still the DJ. Jovi can do it some this year, but I know that I’m the best DJ,” Asseyi said with a laugh.
With her positive attitude, work ethic, and friendly nature, Asseyi might just be able to win that vaunted locker room title back.
Stay tuned for more FC Bayern Munich Frauen coverage this week. On Friday, we’ll have our interview with Sarah Zadrazil and on Saturday our talk with Lina Magull will be featured.