FC Bayern Munchen: A Cup Semifinal, a League Defeat And "The Dutchman"

The past week has been a bizarre one at FC Bayern.

Even the most hopeful of Bayern fans might not have expected Bayern to rebound from a defeat in a few days. The team this season however hardly does what is expected of them.

Eintracht Frankfurt 2-1 Bayern Munich

Due to Miroslav Klose's goal in the seventh minute, (contrary to my belief that he can't hit a bus at the moment), it seemed as if Bayern had done enough to get a victory.

Bayern, however, played really poorly.

When they had possession, they passed it around the defence and barely wanted to attack. Anatoliy Tymoschuk had a great chance to seal it in the second half but failed to do so.

Frankfurt were the team that wanted to attack. They came out firing in the early minutes, and were allowed to do so as Bayern barely wanted to take the ball back from Frankfurt. Then, in the dying minutes, Frankfurt exploited David Alaba's inexperience and scored twice through Juvhel Tsoumou and Martin Fenin.

Mark van Bommel's comments following the match were that one loss doesn't spell "the end of the world". This didn't go down well with a few of the supporters. However, van Bommel was correct.

This is why:

Dortmund 3-0 Leverkusen

Leverkusen were the dominant side. However, three individual errors from the Bayer players led to three goals. Lucas Barrios scored two outstanding goals bringing him up to 15 strikes in 19 games. Diego Maradona doesn't want to take this man to South Africa.

Dimitar Rangelov scored the third, shattering Leverkusen. Jupp Heynckes wasn't too angry though Bayer are slowly falling away. Some of Bayer's srtikes were extremely close to crossing the goal line. It just shows that a curse called "Neverkusen" does exist.

Schalke 2-2 Hamburg

Had Tomas Rincon not cleared a ball half with his head and half with his foot, Schalke would have been at the top of the Bundesliga right now.

Ruud van Nistelrooij opened the scoring with a superb finish. Schalke equalized through Kevin Kuranyi and took the lead via a penalty converted by Ivan Rakitic. Tomas Rincon then made "the clearance" from an Edu shot. Hamburg went on to equalize towards the end through Jonathon Pitroipa.

Schalke as a result remains in second, a point behind Bayern and two points ahead of Leverkusen.

German Cup Semifinals

Werder 2-0 Augsburg

Werder dominated the game, played fantastic one-touch football and eventually won the game via two lovely finishes from Marko Marin in the first half and Claudio Pizarro in the second.

Schalke 0-1 Bayern (a.e.t)

In the Veltins Arena, Schalke created plenty of chances. Kevin Kuranyi played like a man possessed and out for revenge against the Germans going to the World Cup. Carlos Zambrano tried to foul every Bayern player close to him and Van Bommel almost boiled over.

The first half was not entertaining. In the second half, Schalke started the better side but Bayern slowly took over. Bayern started to play one-touch football and dominated the game.

The game however went into extra time. Miro Klose almost scored the opener but his shot went wide. Arjen Robben then took the ball from the centre-line and all the way to the six-yard box. He beat five Schalke players in the process and blasted his shot into goal for the winner.

Robben was close to tears after scoring the goal. He celebrated by taking his shirt off and thus got a yellow card. The goal was a worthy one on a night when nothing but an extraordinary effort was going to win the game.

Arjen Robben's strike was nothing surprising to the supporters. What was surprising was that Bayern managed to keep a clean sheet. Philipp Lahm played very well in attack last night.

However, the best player on the pitch was Bastian Schweinsteiger. He preveted Schalke attacks and began Bayern attacks.

The big question mark is now over Anatoliy Tymoschuk. He will have to emulate Schweini in the Allianz Arena on Tuesday and that seems to be close to impossible at the moment. Schweini even gave the team talk during the interval before extra time!

Bayern vs Stuttgart

Bayern play host to Stuttgart on Saturday. Stuttgart are out of the Champions League and the German Cup. Their target is now a European spot.

Stuttgart is a side that enjoys attacking and they have strikers who are on form. Bayern are currently having problems with the forward line. Olic and Thomas Muller haven't scored lately and Mario Gomez is injured.

I hate to say this, but, Miro Klose is perhaps getting old. He seemed lethargic last night, despite putting in two good efforts.

The Germans will be hoping that he has enough left in his tank for a "last hurrah" at his favourite tournament: The World Cup. Klose will be hoping that Bayern allow him to finish his contract at the club, which expires in June, 2011.

Stuttgart will play with their usual 4-4-2 with Cacau leading the line. Louis Van Gaal might start Anatoliy Tymoschuk ahead of Tuesday's Champions League clash instead of Bastian Schweinsteiger.

Prediction: Bayern 2-1 Stuttgart