Bayern and the League Predator Myth (EN)
Post originally posted in portuguese in February 2018 on the website ESPN FC Brasil.
With the confirmed Goretzka’s transfer to Bayern, we saw the old buzz of the so-called “League Predator” appear once again. A well-known speech that Bavarians would adopt “dishonest” practices to end competitiveness in the Bundesliga and guarantee their hegemony in Germany.
In this post, I will try to elucidate that this “practice” of hiring players from other teams, including rivals, from the same league is not a worthy feat and it is replicated by several clubs.
To begin, we must also make it very clear that any team should think only in herself and if the other teams fail to keep their players with good contracts or reinforce themselves, it will never be the fault of the contracting club.
In our analysis we will start comparing Bayern with other teams within Germany itself. Below is a comparison of the number of players contracted within the Bundesliga and, in parentheses, the total value of these transfers in millions of euros. For comparison, I selected the five Germans with the highest score in the last six seasons:
In clean numbers, we can already point out that among the five clubs, the one that contracted the least within Germany was Bayern himself. In financial spending, the Bavarians were in third place, behind, respectively. Leverkusen and Dortmund. Two factors that most fans are probably unaware of.
Many can still say that even with fewer signings and less money spent, Bayern always hires players from the teams that threaten their hegemony. Therefore, I also raised the number of players who were transferred between the five teams above in the same period:
Bayern, five players: Goretzka, Hummels, Lewandowski, Götze and Dante. Dortmund, six players: Dahoud, Toprak, Götze, Rode, Castro and Reus. Leverkusen, four players: Bender, Kampl, Papadopoulos and Can. Mönchengladbach, four players: Ginter, Kramer, Drmic and Hofmann. Schalke, seven players: Badstuber, Höjbjerg, Sam, Santana, Kirchoff, Barnetta and Neustädter.
In this list we can see that Bayern is again in third place, with the five teams having very similar numbers, showing that the exchange of players between the clubs is constant.
Of course, it is important to note that most of the names presented by Bayern are of greater prominence than most of the other teams. However, it is also essential to say that players like Goretzka and Lewandowski came without costs for the Bavarians.
Besides that of course, highlighting the obvious fact that a team like Bayern, with more money, more media attention and that often reaches the most knock out phases of the Champions League, will be able to attract stronger names for the club.
Now comparing Bayern with other more dominant teams from other leagues in Europe, we can still have a new perspective on the topic. For that I selected PSG, Real Madrid, Barcelona and the top three in the Premier League in the last seven seasons:
In terms of values, Bayern is far behind, second to las, ahead only of Real Madrid. In gross number of players, he is in first place, just slightly ahead of Manchester clubs.
If all of this is still not enough to end this stigma, we can still say that — altogether — Bayern sold or loaned to other German clubs the total of 20 players while signing only 16 in the same period.
In short, even though it is practically extremely normal for a club to hire players from rivals or local teams, Bayern is still at the European average and below the average of the other main German teams. That is, the next time you complain that your team has lost one of its players or that the Bundesliga is not currently competitive, it is good to complain consciously in the right place.
