Why Hansi Flick is an upgrade over Niko Kovac at Bayern Munich?

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MUNICH, GERMANY – DECEMBER 21: (BILD ZEITUNG OUT) Serge Gnabry of FC Bayern Muenchen gestures during the Bundesliga match between FC Bayern Muenchen and VfL Wolfsburg at Allianz Arena on December 21, 2019, in Munich, Germany. (Photo by TF-Images/Getty Images) /

Positional Stability & Balanced Structure

Although Bayern started their 2019/20 Bundesliga journey without losing a single game until matchday seven, signs of defensive frailties were always there. To support this argument with some statistical data, Bayern conceded 10.2 shots per game under Niko Kovac (Bundesliga and UCL fixtures) that reduced to 8.1 shots when playing under the tutelage of Hansi Flick. A plethora of this was made possible due to the tactical and positional tinkering from Flick at a time when Niklas Sule and Lucas Hernandez were marked as long-term absentees suffering from injuries.

As observed, Flick deployed Joshua Kimmich in the number six position quite often compared to his positioning under Kovac, wherein he was seldom used as a pivot. Moreover, Bayern’s team sheet started to see more of Serge Gnabry in the playing eleven with the German winger being used as a makeshift second striker to support Robert Lewandowski.

The results were evident with Gnabry scoring 0.27 goals per 90 minutes under Kovac while spending 65.6 minutes on the field per league fixture managed by the Croatian. While playing under the guidance of Flick, Gnabry managed to score 0.73 goals per 90 minutes as he spent 70.4 minutes on the pitch per league game managed by the new head coach.

Along with making positional changes, Hansi Flick brought vertical and horizontal balance in terms of the players’ movement on the pitch. Bayern was able to cover the space with effective overloads, thus, allowing the Rekordmeister to press efficiently as a unit.

While the defense looked robust with this structural compactness in their half, Bayern remained positionally integrated when they try to win possession in the opponent’s half. This technique offered little room for the rivals to create threatening chances. On the contrary, Bayern’s defense appeared fragile when playing with a high line under Kovac, which allowed the opposition to hurt them on the break.

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As for an analogy with per-game statistics for Bundesliga and UCL fixtures in consideration for this season, Bayern Munich conceded 1.5 goals and scored 2.9 goals under Kovac’s guidance. After Flick took charge, the German champions managed to score 3.2 goals, and the number of goals conceded halved to 0.7. Further filtering out this data to assimilate the attacking and defensive equilibrium, Bayern’s ratio of total shots fired to total shots conceded is around 2.74 under Flick, which is an improvement of 49% compared with 1.84 attained under Kovac.

Adding positional stability using his exceptional tactical acumen is just one side of the coin. To understand the complete picture, we examine how Hansi Flick reinstated grit and a “never say die attitude” among the Bayern army. (Stats courtesy: Whoscored)