Bayern Munich needs to make a statement against RB Leipzig

Bayern Munich has been the top dog of the Bundesliga for a long time. Full of swagger and pomp and surety in their own strength, they’ve been nigh-unstoppable for the last four years, in which they’ve won four straight league titles, bringing their record-setting total to 26 Bundesliga wins. This year, though, they’ve lost some of that swagger — and now they’re facing their fiercest challenge in years.

That’s because RB Leipzig has risen from anonymity to become a powerhouse in the Bundesliga, a newly promoted team playing their first top-division season and enjoying tremendous success doing it. They’ve spent time in first place this season, and are only in second behind Bayern on goal differential, a challenge that the Bavarians seemed ill-prepared for, and have struggled to deal with. With the first match between the two sides looming on Wednesday, it’s time for Bayern to make a statement — one that could prove difficult to make.

Things have been decidedly shaky for Bayern of late, despite their impressive-looking five-match winning streak. They struggled badly in three of those wins, to much lesser sides like Bayer Leverkusen, Mainz 05, and Darmstadt 98, and their only emphatic win was over a Wolfsburg side sitting close to the drop zone. Even their win over Atlético Madrid was seen by some as much down to Atléti not being up to the challenge as it was Bayern looking especially powerful.

So with Leipzig coming in on a hot streak of their own, with just one league loss all season, Bayern are in dire need of a return to form in their last match before the winter break begins. A loss would be tantamount to disaster — hitting the halfway point in the season not in first place, and not being there because they lost to their only direct rival, would be a deep disappointment to Bayern and their fans alike. The fact that such a setback would come at the hands of a team seen as upstarts would be even worse, and could see Carlo Ancelotti have to deal with potentially serious consequences over it.

Bayern’s manager is already under fire to some degree, with his team widely seen as underperforming this season. Ancelotti got the Bavarians off to a solid start to the season, but ever since a three-match blip in form from late September into early October, Bayern has rarely seemed like the same team they were before, as though they’ve lost their edge. Even as a team that’s largely looked adrift, they’ve still done well enough to go on two five-match winning streaks since then, but they just haven’t looked like Bayern Munich very often along the way.

Many teams would be happy to find success while not playing at their best, but Bayern Munich isn’t many teams. Expectations are much higher there — if they’re not the best team in Europe, they at least want to be in that conversation. And while Bayern certainly has the talent to be a major part of that conversation, their performances this season have them on the outside looking in.

Adding a loss to Leipzig on top of that already-growing disappointment is unlikely to get Ancelotti sacked so soon, but it will certainly shorten his leash. Bayern’s directors and supporters alike want to go into the winter break feeling like they’re in control of the Bundesliga.

That pressure only serves to further cement what Bayern need to do in this match: They must put their struggles behind them, become the Bayern of old again, beat Leipzig, and do it emphatically. If Bayern is going to become a dominant force again, this is the first step they have to take — and if they don’t, there will be a lot of hard questions for Ancelotti to answer.