Four takeaways as Bayern Munich book place in DFB Pokal final

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Ivan Perisic, Bayern Munich and Almamy Toure, Eintracht Frankfurt.(Photo by Kai Pfaffenbach/Pool via Getty Images) /

A tale of two halves for Bayern Munich

DFB fixtures are always different than regular Bundesliga ones due to the fact they are a knockout format, and one loss eliminates a team from the competition. This means a lot of teams will play different tactically, and especially against Bayern, will attack harder in hopes of knocking off the title favorites. And in knockout games, anything can happen. This season is a perfect example of that, as the fourth tier side, FC Saarbrucken made it all the way to the semifinals of the competition.

The match started as a typical Bayern Munich match. The team pressed and attacked relentlessly, giving Frankfurt no room to even get out of their half. Leon Goretzka was critical in shutting down any attack Frankfurt tried to mount, while David Alaba used his skills to spray passes all over the field and even found himself well up the pitch accompanying the attack.

Eventually, this approach was rewarded with a beautiful diving heading goal by Ivan Perisic. The move started from the back and quickly advanced up the field leading to a quick cross by Thomas Muller onto the head of Perisic. Kingsley looked good outside of the box dribbling, and keeping possession of the ball, but struggled when he got inside of the box, finding himself in great positions. Needless to say, the away side found themselves lucky to be down only 1-0 at halftime.

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The second half was a different story. Immediately from the start, Frankfurt attacked and put pressure on Bayern. At first, Bayern looked like they were going to be able to weather the storm and regain control of the match. However, in the 69th minute, that all changed when Danny da Costa put the ball past Manuel Neuer from a ball going across the box.

Frankfurt showed in this half that Bayern are mortal and that if pressured in an organized manner, it can be scored upon and potentially beaten. Bayern are so close to winning the domestic double. If they want to go far in Europe, they will have to clean this up and focus 100% on the entire match.