FCB ‘disappointed and angry’ at defeat

Hamburg are rapidly becoming public enemy number one at Bayern, after the champions failed to beat the northerners for the fifth time in a row. In the Friday night fixture marking the start of the second half of the Bundesliga campaign, FCB fell at the HSH Nordbank Arena by the only goal of the game.

The Bayern camp was “disappointed and angry” afterwards, Jürgen Klinsmann reported. The FCB boss was displeased with his side’s start to the match: “We were asleep for the first half hour.“ His men then declined “first-rate chances“ in the second half: “The ball somehow didn’t want to go in.“

Reaction to Hamburg v Bayern:

Karl-Heinz Rummenigge: “It was an avoidable defeat. Especially in the first half-hour, we didn’t invest enough and didn’t show enough aggression. Maybe after our excellent display [in Stuttgart] we thought we could do it with half the effort, but that won’t do against any opponents, and especially not against HSV. We played really well in the second half, but failed to convert some excellent chances. We could have had at least a draw, maybe even a win. As of this evening, HSV are definitely in the title race.“

Jürgen Klinsmann: “We were asleep for the first half hour. We stood too far off our men, we didn’t apply any pressure, and we let HSV play. None of my team showed up. We slowly picked up speed after the half-hour, but we conceded a stupid goal just before half-time. We played reasonable football in the second half. We created a string of chances, but the ball somehow didn’t want to go in. We’re disappointed and angry now. We came here looking for a result. We had enough chances to cancel out Hamburg’s goal, but we didn’t put them away, and we’re going home empty-handed.”

Mark van Bommel: “We had to score in the second half. Hamburg did very well before half-time. If you stand off your man, you can run as much as you like but you won’t make your tackles. But if we beat Dortmund in our next match, we’ll have a point more than we did from the first two games of the season.“

Philipp Lahm: “We took our time to get going, although we did have the first clear-cut chance through Bastian Schweinsteiger. If we’d have scored then, like we did against Stuttgart, we’d have been very hard to beat – but we missed our chance. We still created plenty of opportunities, but we’ve failed to score.“

Martin Jol (HSV coach): “We played very well in the first half, and we should have gone two up right at the start of the second. We rode our luck after that, but Bayern were lucky too. An unbelievable match.“

Mladen Petric (HSV): “We’re all over the moon. The key to success was a disciplined team performance. We were totally on top in the first half, but Bayern put us under pressure in the second. We hurled ourselves in front of their shots, and all eleven men defended well.“

Frank Rost (HSV): “It was a tight game and both teams could have won it. Tiny errors make the difference at this level. We rode our luck and brought home the bacon today. We’ve got to make sure we keep it going in Karlsruhe next week. If we can, we could be there or thereabouts until the end of the season.“