The world sat on edge in anticipation of Messi, Xavi and Iniesta dominating for Barcelona or sat awaiting, expecting Ronaldo and Mourinho, ‘the Special one” to do the same for Real Madrid. It was not to be, Barcelona and Real Madrid were dismantled by the Germans, Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund. Incredibly Barcelona were destroyed with Bayern winning convincingly, 7-0 on aggregate. A shock? A surprise? To the casual observer it may appear to be so. But to those that have been watching and studying the Germans, the final scoreline may have been a surprise, but not the win.

Bayern Munich players celebrate in their semi final win against Barcelona

German football and the national team has always been of a high standard, consistently doing well in World and European cups, ranking behind only Brazil in trophies won. However, in recent times, some winning the 1996 European Championship or reaching the 2002 World Cup final, masked the fact that the quality of play in German football was in decline. It was only after the disaster of a first-round exit at Euro 2004 that minds were concentrated on the task of turning things around.  To do so, they set out to emulate the most successful football currently played on the planet. That would be Spanish football, and more accurately Barcelona’s version of the Dutch possession oriented game, originally brought to them via Johan Cruyff.

The German Federation and coaches agreed that they had to make a change and all the clubs had to participate otherwise it would not be successful. Their vision as described by honorary Bayern Munich President, Franz Beckenbauer, was to play that possession oriented Dutch/Spanish style football with bigger, stronger, faster German players.

The German national  team were the first beneficiaries as they excelled at the 2010 World Cup with brilliant counterattacking destructions of England and Argentina, before being defeated 1-0 by Spain in the semi-final. The loss to Spain was a good test, as it showed them how much further they needed to go in terms of dominating games with ball retention and possession.

Bayern Munich got their own revolution going as they  went out and hired the Dutch Maestro Louis van Gaal to impose the system. In Van Gaal’s first season, he put the system in play to good effect, he got the team organized and playing the initial phase of the system; high up the pitch and generally dominating possession with a clear emphasis upon speedy counterattacking. He brought in Arjen Robben and Franck Ribéry to play the flanks, cutting in onto the strong sides, while in midfield they already had the magnificent Bastian Schweinsteiger pulling the strings and orchestrating play.

When Van Gaal left, the baton was passed to Jupp Heynckes to continue the process. Under Heynckes, Bayern became superior both with, and without out the ball, in their pressing and defensive organization. Bayern’s stunning dismantling of Brarcelona has been the accumulation of multiple years of play.

heir victory over Barcelona was swift and impressive, but it was a result of years of planning and preparation. It was not a success that happened over night.

Heynckes, put the stunning victory partly down to his meticulous preparation explaining that;  “he analysed the Barcelona team, how they will play, how the players move, where do they run to, how do they play in attack,’’ said Heynckes. Defensively we worked very hard and Barcelona couldn’t do anything, they had one-and-a-half chances. You have to know the opponent and we did.

“What the boys did on the pitch, and the tactical way they played was fantastic. We played a fantastic game. The decisive factor was the organisation of the team, defending intelligently, every player was really happy to stay back and be good. “We have a lot of creativity, quality and class when we are going forward. We have the space and use it and can beat any opponent. “We tried to neutralise Messi and we did a great job in that. But Barcelona is not just Messi, they have Xavi and [Andrés] Iniesta and other very good players. But we dominated.

Their victory over Barcelona was swift and impressive, but it was a result of years of planning and preparation. It was not a success that happened over night.  For Barcelona and Spain, the two losses to Germans sides do not represent a passing of the torch, but more a shifting of the tide. The final phase of the revolution appears to be the signing of Pep Guardiola to complete the task of playing the Dutch / Spanish inspired game with bigger, stronger, faster German players.