Despite all the talk of the English Premier League's seemingly bottomless riches and the Bundesliga struggling to compete financially, two German sides are in the men's Champions League semifinals and England's finest are instead licking their wounds.
"I don't think anyone thought we'd progress against Arsenal," admitted Bayern Munich President Herbert Hainer after their quarterfinal triumph.
Bayern will face Real Madrid on April 30 and May 8, while Borussia Dortmund take on Paris Saint-Germain on May 1 and May 7 for a place in the Wembley final on June 1, where UEFA bosses probably expected an English side to help supplement the atmosphere.
Yet it could be two German teams in the final, just like the last time the game was hosted in London in 2013, when Bayern edged Dortmund 2-1. Since then, 2020 was the only year the Bundesliga had two sides in the last four and no English team featured. Then, too, Bayern took the title — the last of their six European Cups.
That was a unique season due to the coronavirus pandemic, where the quarters, semis and final were all held in Portugal as one-off matches with no fans.
German teams beating English sides to the men's Champions League last four is a rarity rather than the norm. So, what are the reasons for Bayern's and Dortmund's success this season after Arsenal, Manchester City, Manchester United and Newcastle United all fell by the wayside?
The most obvious reason is that the English teams were too distracted by the Premier League title race, whereas Bayern and Dortmund had long given up hope in the Bundesliga amid Bayer Leverkusen's incredible season, so could concentrate more on the Champions League.
Bayern beat Arsenal 1-0 in their home quarterfinal after a 2-2 draw in London. The Gunners' focus and energy was, to some extent, elsewhere. The games for Arsenal came among crunch Premier League clashes, which included a surprise 2-0 defeat at home to Aston Villa that hit their domestic title chances.
Bayern, meanwhile, have all their eggs in one basket, the Champions League being their last hope of a trophy in Thomas Tuchel's final few weeks in charge. Tuchel wants his legacy to be a Champions League triumph rather than just being the Bayern coach who finally surrendered the Bundesliga after 11 seasons. He was desperate to beat Arsenal, and it showed in the way he celebrated the win.
"It means a lot to me. It's an important step. Semifinals, last four," Tuchel, who won Europe's premier club competition with Chelsea in 2021, told reporters.
Chelsea might have won the European title three years ago, and Man City last term, but some of this season's Premier League entrants were not as au fait with the Champions League as perennial qualifiers Bayern and Dortmund.
Manchester United, who went out in the group phase, have been in and out of the competition in recent seasons, with the glory years under Sir Alex Ferguson long gone.
Newcastle's inexperience helped Dortmund top their group, while Bayern profited from having greater Champions League know-how than Arsenal.
Mikel Arteta, the Arsenal boss, said: "We haven't played in the competition for seven years; we haven't been in this position for 14 years."
"Fast forward, super quick in one season, and we had the capacity and the quality to be in the semi-final, [but we are not] because the margins have been very small," he added. "Those margins sometimes are coming from something that maybe we don't have yet."
This season's quarterfinals also demonstrated how teams have begun to play differently in the knockout stages following the abolition of the away goals rule by UEFA, boosting the two German sides and hampering the English.
Had the rule still been in place, Arsenal could possibly have been more attacking at the Allianz Arena following a 2-2 draw in the first leg in London. Dortmund, meanwhile, had to go for goals against Atletico Madrid, with their away goal from the first leg counting for little.
After drawing 3-3 at the Bernabeu, Real Madrid would previously have been aware that a lower scoring home draw for Manchester City would have sent Pep Guardiola's side through in the second leg. Instead, Los Blancos could afford to sit back, knowing that a draw could eventually lead to a penalty shootout which they won.
"They defended deeper than previous seasons," City's Pep Guardiola said. "They did it better than us."
Another plus point for the German sides eclipsing the English is the race for an extra Champions League spot in next season's revamped competition, which will increase to 36 teams in one big league.
To make up the extra numbers, the two best performing domestic leagues in Europe get an extra wide berth, each using a complicated statistics called coefficients.
Italy looks likely to snatch one spot, with Germany battling England for the other. Bayern or Dortmund going on to win the Champions League should secure the Bundesliga a fifth spot, and if Dortmund end up finishing fifth in the German top flight but win the European Cup, a sixth place for Germany might also be up for grabs.
So much for a league supposedly significantly weaker than the powerful Premier League.
Edited by: Kalika Mehta
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