Hasan Salihamidzic praises Serge Gnabry’s performance in Bayern’s win over SC Freiburg

Serge Gnabry scored a goal and provided an assist in Bayern Munich’s comprehensive 5-0 win over SC Freiburg at the Allianz Arena last Sunday and, quite arguably, put forth one of his strongest performances of the season thus far. It was the first time he’d recorded a goal or assist for Bayern across all competitions since the late August victory over Viktoria Koln in the first round of the DFB-Pokal and he’s been in and out of the starting lineup for Julian Nagelsmann.

With his goal rut for over a month earlier this season, questions had been asked of Gnabry, as he’s a player that rarely seems to find large spells of consistency for both club and country. At time, it seems like he will really turn it on for Die Mannschaft, but it won’t exactly carry over to his Bayern form, or vice versa. With his performance against Freiburg, though, sporting director Hasan “Brazzo” Salihamidzic was very pleased with what he saw from the attacker.

“I like to see him like that. When he has really good body tension, when he sprints like that, when he takes his actions, his finishes,” Brazzo said, explaining the positives that he saw from Gnabry in the win over Freiburg (Az). “After all, he has everything: he has a header, he has a super shot with his left and right. When Serge is in top form, we have a really good player,” he continued.

Gnabry’s header to open the scoring against Freiburg was harder than it looked. It’s very difficult to generate a lot of power on a ball that’s just sort of lofted an looping in the air without much pace, but Gnabry made no mistake with his pinpoint effort from about eight yards out. His pass for Sadio Mane’s goal was as good, if not slightly better, than his header — it was perfectly weighted, perfectly timed, and put Mane in a fantastic position to chip over the on-rushing Mark Flekken.

Photo by Alexander Hassenstein/Getty Images

For Nagelsmann and Bayern, as the fixture congestion continues to pile up and injuries start to accumulate, he will be hoping that Gnabry is able to continue on in this run of form, especially now that Leroy Sane is facing three weeks on the sidelines due to an injury sustained against Freiburg. He’s shown in previous seasons that he can step up during the big moments, so that will be the minimum expectation.

Interested in more Bayern Munich content? Check out our detailed Augsburg preview along with analysis of the win over SC Freiburg and a major question about Robert Lewandowski in the latest episode of our podcast. Listen to it below or on Spotify.

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