Robert Lewandowski: MD5’s Man of the Matchday and the Bayern Munich goal machine with incredible numbers
It's not often Robert Lewandowski asks to be taken off, let alone after scoring a hat-trick, but then again 2020 has been an extraordinary year for Bayern Munich's otherworldly No.9.
"Robert scored a hat-trick, and had already indicated he wanted to be substituted at some point," Bayern coach Hansi Flick said of Lewandowski's 68th-minute withdrawal in the 5-0 win over Eintracht Frankfurt on Bundesliga Matchday 5. "Even it it was a novelty, I was ready for it."
If only Frankfurt could say the same of their efforts to tame the recently crowned UEFA Best Player in Europe.
Scoring with his left and right foot, as well as his head - 'a perfect hat-trick' in football parlance - Lewandowski made history as the first player to hit 10 goals after five matches of a Bundesliga season.
To mark the occasion - one he modestly played down as "of secondary importance to the team" - bundesliga.com presents the numbers behind LewandGOALski's year of wonders...
1 - On 1 October 2020, Lewandowski was named been named Europe's Player of the Year for 2019/20, beating off competition beat from Manchester City midfielder Kevin De Bruyne and Bayern teammate Manuel Neuer to claim the prize. It was reward for a season in which he became the first player ever to win a continental treble while also being the top scorer in each competition: 34 in the Bundesliga, 15 in the Champions League and six in the DFB Cup.
Watch: All 34 of Robert Lewandowski's Bundesliga goals in 2019/20
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2 - Lewandowski has scored more than twice in a single match in two of his eight competitive outings for Bayern in 2020.
3 - With 34 goals in 2019/20, Lewandowski claimed his third successive Bundesliga top scorer's cannon.
4 - A fourth successive Torjägerkanone is in Lewandowski's grasp, and would be a Bundesliga record.
5 - No player had scored as many goals after five rounds of Bundesliga fixtures prior to Lewandowski's heroics against Frankfurt.
9 - The number of braces Lewandowski has scored across all competitions in 2020. Of those nine, six were in the Bundesliga.
9 - His total number of goals across his last three Bundesliga matches alone: four against Hertha Berlin, two against Arminia Bielefeld, and a hat-trick against Frankfurt. The 32-year-old did this once before in 2015, which included five goals in nine minutes against Wolfsburg. Hoffenheim forward Andrej Kramaric, meanwhile, did it across two seasons: taking in Matchday 34 of the 2019/20 campaign and the opening two matches of 2020/21.
9 - The Poland international scored in nine consecutive Champions League appearances prior to Bayern's 1-0 win over Paris Saint-Germain in the 2019/20 final in Lisbon. It was the joint second longest run of all time, behind Cristiano Ronaldo's 11-game streak.
10 - Lewandowski has reached double figures in the Bundesliga for the 10th successive season.
15 - Lewandowski's cross-competition assist count since the turn of the year.
17 - His current goal-scoring streak: 17 in his previous 10 Bundesliga matches.
18 - With his double against Bielefeld on Matchday 4, the former Borussia Dortmund striker ensured he has scored against all 18 of the Bundesliga's current clubs.
19 - Lewandowski has registered 19 Bundesliga goals in 13 matches since the coronavirus-enforced break - a league high.
21 - Twenty-one Bundesliga matches have come and gone since he last failed to fire in back-to-back appearances.
Watch: Lewandowski - a tireless world-beater
23 - Lewandowski has scored at least once in 23 of his 30 competitive appearances so far in 2020.
32 - How old Germany's Player of the Year turned on his last birthday, on 21 August 2020.
35 - Lewandowski's goal tally at club level this calendar year. No player based in Europe's top five leagues has more. Juventus' Ronaldo is second in the charts, with 28 goals in 27 games.
55 - All of Lewandowski's goals for Bayern in 2019/20, the last of which fell in Bayern's Champions League semi-final win over Lyon on 19 August 2020.
64 - Against Eintracht on Matchday 5,, he scored at least twice in a Bundesliga game for the 64th time. Only another Bayern legend, Gerd Müller, has managed that more often (87).
106 - The indomitable Pole's goal count in 99 Bundesliga matches for Bayern at the Allianz Arena.
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