Unnecessary mistakes and no luck cost us

“We had a surprising amount of chances to score, we should have taken one or two of them and made fewer mistakes,” said Christian Heidel after the game. “It was a deserved victory for Bayern because, as expected, they dominated the game,” he added. Bayern were particularly good at punishing the away side when they lost the ball, and that’s what happened with the goals to go 1-0 and 2-1 down.

Domenico Tedesco also thought that the home side deserved to win the game: “Bayern were simply better, they got into us and had a lot of chances. When you want to get something in Munich, you have to defend from the front. We didn’t do that.”

Four key minutes

As well as the mistakes that led to the first two goals, Schalke will be disappointed with what happened in the 240 seconds between the 53rd and 57th minute. Yevhen Konoplyanka had a very good chance after good work by Weston McKennie (53’) and Jeffrey Bruma headed the ball against the post (55’). However, Serge Gnabry then headed in for the hosts after the ball fell to him somewhat fortunately from Robert Lewandowski (57’).

“If we’d have got the equaliser, maybe we could have got another through a counterattack or something,” said Daniel Caligiuri, who picked up his fifth yellow card of the season yesterday and so will miss the game against Freiburg (16/2, 15:30 CET). “We could have got more today. The chances were there and, with a bit more luck, it would have finished 2-2 or 3-3,” added Jeffrey Bruma.

Obviously it’s “impossible to defend every chance for a goal against Bayern,” said Caligiuri. “What’s annoying is that we conceded from a few mistakes. We came back superbly and made it 1-1, but then it was 1-2 straightaway,” he added. Bastian Oczipka had similar thoughts: “When Bayern beat you, no one says anything because they have such quality. But to concede the goals like we did today is just disappointing.”

Schalke will want to set things right against SC Freiburg next weekend. “Now we have to focus on the next match. We go into every game like it’s a final,” said Omar Mascarell. With a focussed performance and a bit more luck in the key moments, the Royal Blues can pick up three points in their next game.