Serge Gnabry hails Bayern Munich’s “important statement” in SC Freiburg demolition

Bayern Munich’s 5-0 demolition of SC Freiburg saw a major return to the team’s early-season form — even if the personnel and tactics have changed since then. One player enjoying the evolution? Serge Gnabry, the winger who started this season in a striker duo up front and shook off a recent spell of up-and-down form along with his teammates today.

“It felt great to deliver such a good game from the whole team today,” Gnabry said after the game (via @iMiaSanMia). “An important statement after a few unnecessarily difficult weeks and we want to continue like this. We played very well, we were in control of the game in every phase and had a lot of good chances.”

Gnabry was deployed on the right wing today, where he looked a lot more comfortable than the recent games where he was tasked with leading the line on his own up front. He still was able to pick his moments to dart inside and challenge the goal — but was equally comfortable hanging back and delivering beautiful, arcing crosses towards box targets at the far post.

It was a pattern reminiscent of the construction of Bayern’s Champions League Final winner over PSG two years ago — that time, from Joshua Kimmich to Kingsley Coman. One of these balls, from deeper upfield, careened wildly through the air before landing at Sadio Mané’s feet in front of goal for Bayern’s fourth of the day. And, of course, Gnabry also opened the scoring himself — a pinpoint header that needed some guiding from range.

Photo by Alexander Hassenstein/Getty Images

But it’s not that Gnabry has managed to fashion some sort of guiding system into the ball. He and his teammates played with the right energy from start to finish, never let complacency set in, and outright pummeled a top-four Bundesliga challenger. Like they were nothing!

Bayern have had their struggles this year maintaining form — today’s display marks a strong stride back in the right direction. Chef Serge is cooking again, and so are the Bavarians. Bundesliga, look out.

Interested in more analysis of the game? We have that plus so much more (including a discussion of Robert Lewandowski and an Augsburg preview) in the latest episode of our podcast. Listen to it below or on Spotify.

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