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Reaction to Bayern v Bayer

Jonker: Big hearts and unbelievable desire

17.04.2011

Andries Jonker’s maiden match as FCB coach ended in a thumping 5-1 victory over Bayer Leverkusen, leaving the caretaker boss praising his team’s “big hearts and unbelievable desire”. Hat-trick hero Mario Gomez said it had been “a difficult week at the club, but we’ve given our answer on the field today.” The result also sent Bayern third in the table. “We’re ahead of Hannover, and the pressure’s on them now,” said Jonker, “our job is to win the last four matches.”

Reaction to Bayern v Leverkusen:

Andries Jonker: “We did our analysis and concluded the game would be won and lost in midfield. That's where we had to be up for the fight. My players understood what had to be done. Especially in the first half, we got stuck into the fight with big hearts and unbelievable desire, and won a lot of tackles. Once you’ve taken an early lead, you have the option of playing on the break, and we were outstanding in that respect. When you’re 4-0 up at half-time, you know it’ll be difficult to reproduce the performance in the second half, because your concentration goes. Leverkusen deserved their goal, but I was pleased we scored another. We’re ahead of Hannover now, and the pressure’s on them. Our job is to win the last four matches. We’ll invest everything we have, just as we did today.”

Philipp Lahm: “We played well, especially in the first half. We took the lead from a set play, which hasn’t been the case very often for us recently. All eleven players were sensational in our defensive effort today. It certainly wasn’t the best of days for Leverkusen, but it was a very, very good one for us, and that’s why we were 4-0 up at half-time. We don’t intend to surrender third place now. We have a difficult game away to Frankfurt next week. We’ll have to work very hard, as hard as we did today, but I’m confident we’ll hold onto third now. If we win all our games, that’s where we’ll finish. And if a chance of second presents itself, we’ll gratefully accept it, although I don’t really believe it will.”

Mario Gomez: “It was good to score three, very important in fact. The game was over at half-time. It was a difficult week at the club, with lots of unrest and pressure from outside, but we’ve given our answer on the field today. It was an unbelievable display, not just the five goals, but our aggression in the first 45 minutes. Every player defended high up the pitch, and Leverkusen couldn’t cope. We wanted it more than our opponents today. We wanted it so it would be a good start for Andries, who’s put in outstanding work over the last two years, but we wanted it for ourselves too. There are four more games, and we have to win them all if we’re to hit our target.”

Rudi Völler (Leverkusen director of sport): “We gifted them the first two goals. You could argue we were too attacking in the first half, and you have to say they took every chance they had. That's football. Unfortunately we didn’t put up much of a fight, because it was all over after 45 minutes. But we’ve not come close to our true form today. We showed we can play football, but only from time to time. We’ll lick our wounds for a couple of days, and then take the seven points we need to be sure of second.”

Jupp Heynckes (Leverkusen coach): “We have to freely admit that Bayern were much better and deserved to win. My team never approached their true potential, and I can’t understand it. If you go a goal down to Bayern after seven minutes, you have to defend with great discipline. You have to close down the space when you’re not in possession, but we didn’t do it. We gifted Bayern the second and third, and we were wide open for the fourth. It was no surprise we were four down at half-time. It's all but impossible to turn it round from there, even though we were much better in the second half. It was disappointing overall, and a real setback to lose 5-1. We came here looking to win and cement second place, but we still have four games in which to do that.”

Simon Rolfes (Leverkusen captain): “My own goal was a bad way to start, and we made Bayern stronger by handing them a second. We were too keen to get forward. We should have kept it tighter and tried to hold it to 2-0 at half-time, when we could have attempted to turn it around. But we’d blown it by the end of the first half. We never got going today. We’ll try and defend second place now. There’s no hope of top spot any more.”

Credit: FC Bayern Munich (www.fcbayern.t-com.de)