Mario Gomez: The €35 Million Misfit Finally Finding His Feet at Bayern Munich

Mario Gomez is enjoying a goal-scoring renaissance. Previously prolific at VFB Stuttgart, he seemed to have lost his way after moving to Bayern Munich for a Bundesliga record €35 million last year.

Gomez scored a career high 35 goals in his final season at VFB Stuttgart, but managed only 14 in a disappointing debut campaign for Bayern Munich. 

The out of sorts striker looked like an unnecessarily expensive adornment to a highly successful squad that already had more than its fair share of front men. 

While Gomez was struggling his teammates thrived. Bayern Munich won the double and reached the Champion's League final with Ivica Olic, who had been signed on a free transfer, consistently preferred to the €35 million man. 

The German national team defied expectations to reach the semi-finals of the World Cup but yet again Gomez was overlooked when it came to first team selection.  As a striker with a career average of a goal every other game he should have been at the forefront of these illustrious campaigns. Instead he found himself a frustrated spectator, consigned to watch a series of key matches from the bench. 

He did make a late appearance in the Champions League final and a number of substitute appearances during the World Cup but without registering a single goal. Bayern Munich's preferred strike force consisted of Thomas Mueller and Ivica Olic with even Miroslav Klose ahead of Gomez in the pecking order.

Mueller and Klose were virtually ever present for Germany in South Africa with Lucas Podolski preferred as the third prong in the attacking trident. Even a suspension for Klose wasn't enough to get Gomez into the side with Cacau given the nod instead.

In the space of a season, Gomez had gone from prolific to perennial. The 14 goals he managed for Bayern Munich would have been scant consolation to a man who had found the back of the net 63 times in his final two seasons at VFB Stuttgart.

So disillusioned was Gomez with life in Germany that he actually agitated for a deadline day move to Liverpool, with his adviser Uli Ferber supposedly issuing the following statement:

'"When a club like Liverpool inquires, their interest cannot be pushed off the table. Gomez would just like to play football again."

Bayern Munich were unsurprisingly reluctant to allow their record signing to leave on loan but Gomez's frustration was understandable. The season was already four games old by this stage and he had yet to start a single match. Even life in the Europa League with Liverpool seemed preferable to spending another season on the bench with the reigning Bundesliga champions.

Gomez's role as the most expensive substitute in the history of football continued until October when he was finally given his first start of the season against a rejuvenated Borussia Dortmund. For once he played the whole 90 minutes, but failed to find the net as Bayern Munich slumped to a 2-0 defeat.

Despite the disappointment of the loss to Borussia Dortmund, manager Louis Van Gaal kept faith with his misfiring striker. He was rewarded in spectacular style when Gomez grabbed a hat trick the following game in a 3-0 win over Hannover 96.

With Miroslav Klose and Ivica Olic consigned to the substitutes bench, Gomez finally began to recapture the sort of goal scoring form which prompted Bayern Munich to splash out €35 Million to secure his services in the first place. Goals against CFR Cluj in the Champions League and Freiburg in the Bundesliga were followed by another hat trick this time away at CFR Cluj.

Van Gaal deserves his share of the credit for showing faith in Gomez when he failed to score in two successive Bundesliga games. On both occasions he was given at least 80 minutes before being replaced and the Bayern Munich manager resisted the temptation to reinstate either Ivica Olic or Miroslav Klose to the starting line up as a result of Gomez's two game drought.

With nine goals in 15 appearances Gomez is now on track for the kind of 30 goal haul which Bayern Munich thought they would be virtually guaranteed when signing a striker of his stature. Eight of those goals have come in the last six games and Gomez is rapidly putting the previous season's profligacy behind him.

Bayern Munich are lagging nine points behind league leaders Borussia Dortmund after only nine games and the rehabilitation of their record signing could not have come at a better time. Gomez might have made a slow start to life at the Allianz Arena but the scurge of Bundesliga defences is back with a bang,.