Bayern Munich's Serge Gnabry: "The title race is still open"
Bayern Munich attacker Serge Gnabry has issued a warning to the rest of the Bundesliga that the defending champions will not give up their crown without a fight, saying "the title race is still open".
Gnabry scored his second late goal of the week, finding the net in the 89th minute to seal a 2-0 victory over Wolfsburg on Saturday, following on from his strike in the fifth minute of stoppage time to crown a 3-1 triumph in Freiburg on Wednesday.
Those two triumphs extended Bayern’s winning run to three consecutive Bundesliga games, leaving Hansi Flick’s side in third place over the winter break, three points ahead of perennial rivals Borussia Dortmund, four behind leaders RB Leipzig and two adrift of Borussia Mönchengladbach.
That state of affairs has given Bayern’s title rivals confidence to openly talk about their desire to mount a challenge for the Bundesliga Meisterschale, with BVB’s Marco Reus, Leipzig’s Timo Werner and Gladbach’s Marcus Thuram all doing so in recent weeks.
But after the final whistle blew against Wolfsburg, Gnabry served a reminder that nothing is set in stone.
“We aim to win every game," said the 13-time Germany international. "We shouldn’t have dropped points against Leverkusen and Gladbach, so we kind of made amends with the late wins against Freiburg and Wolfsburg. Now we’re back.
Watch: Gnabry: "The title race is still open"
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“We had a strong first half of the season,” continued the 24-year-old, who has six goals and as many assists in 15 Bundesliga outings this season.
“Obviously the losses [against Gladbach and Leverkusen] put us behind, but I think apart from that we’ve played good football and, in the last couple of games, showed character to come back. I think the [title] race is still open.”
With that in mind, he will be hoping Bayern can once again defy the weight of history: over the past ten seasons, the team that has been top at the winter break has gone on to be crowned champions on seven occasions. Only Wolfsburg (in 2008/09) and Bayern (in both 2009/10 and 2018/19) have bucked the trend in recent years.
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