The newly named Franz Beckenbauer Supercup has many uses. Unlike some of its continental counterparts, this curtain-raising meeting between league and cup winners tends to brim with a pleasing intensity. It unfolds in a partisan atmosphere too, taking place at one of the two competitors’ stadium rather than at a neutral venue, so we feel the real straight away.
Telling us what to expect for the coming nine months in the Bundesliga, however, isn’t often one of the Supercup’s strengths. Bayer Leverkusen gave a faithful impression of their double-winning form in emerging victorious in last year’s edition by punking Stuttgart with a late Patrik Schick goal before winning on penalties, having played a huge chunk of the match with 10 men. The year before, Harry Kane made an inauspicious Bayern Munich debut at the end of “a crazy 24 hours”, entering the field to tumultuous acclaim only for his new team to subsequently be flattened by Dani Olmo’s hat-trick for Leipzig. Pep Guardiola, meanwhile, never won it in his three years at Bayern.
Maybe this time, though, it’s a case of new name, new game. We can’t know yet but the first edition named after Der Kaiser had a ring of familiarity, perhaps even inevitability, to it. As the announcer at the MHP Arena informed us of four minutes of added time, many Stuttgart fans whistled and booed. Can’t it be over already? In the event, Jamie Leweling pulled one back in that time to reduce the home team’s loss to 2-1, but it was highly flattering. All in all, the contest underlined that even without Jamal Musiala, Bayern are formidable. And inevitable.
Kane, who opened the scoring for Bayern’s domestic season with an unforgiving finish, raised eyebrows in the German media by claiming Vincent Kompany’s current group is “one of the smallest squads I’ve played in”, which, given the step up from Tottenham to Bayern, is jarring. “We’re a little light, if we’re being honest,” he said.
That may well be the case in Kane’s sector of the pitch, with Leroy Sané, Kingsley Coman and Thomas Müller exiting and only Luis Díaz arriving for now, though the Colombian popped up in the Supercup with the sort of winning goal that previous wingers of this parish simply wouldn’t score; a stooping mid-range header from a Serge Gnabry cross. Díaz is a deluxe addition, threatening to become Bayern’s most energetic wide player since Franck Ribéry, with more goals to boot.
There is likely more to come before the transfer deadline, with a long season ahead, and Bayern are keen on Nick Woltemade; the Stuttgart striker’s future loomed over the Supercup as much as his impressive frame did. The champions have made their interest in Germany’s under-21 star clear and the feeling is mutual; Woltemade let other interested parties – reportedly including Napoli and Real Madrid – know that he wanted only to go to Munich. But with Bayern balking at a €70m asking price for a free transfer arrival from Werder Bremen last summer, no wonder Stuttgart’s chief executive, Alexander Wehrle, felt confident in saying “the matter is closed” on Saturday. We will see.
Perhaps the best news for Bayern is that their closest rivals of the past two seasons are undergoing a period of even more pronounced change. Leverkusen are now post-Xabi Alonso and his replacement, Erik ten Hag, has seen Florian Wirtz, Jeremie Frimpong and Jonathan Tah all go, with the experience of Granit Xhaka and the captain, Lukas Hradecky, also taking leave. Some fear for Leverkusen’s future without Xhaka, though it is legitimate to ask if he made sense minus Alonso, as the now Real Madrid coach always spoke about the midfielder as his representative on the pitch.
Despite his Manchester United struggles, Ten Hag is hugely respected in Germany, and Leverkusen have never forgotten what they are despite the incredible successes of 2024 – a club with roughly half of Borussia Dortmund’s budget that must seek to become established as a Champions League perennial. Having made €210m on transfers already this window, they will lean on younger players, with the teenagers Ibrahim Maza and Axel Tape shining in pre-season, with a few big signings to come to supplement them, probably led by Sevilla’s immaculate French defender Loïc Badé.
RB Leipzig are in a not dissimilar boat for different reasons, having failed to make Europe last time out for the first time since they were promoted in 2016. With a new coach in Ole Werner – who was excellent at Bremen – and a young sporting director, Marcel Schäfer, it was necessary for Red Bull’s global head of sport, one Jürgen Klopp, to stick his head above the parapet in an early training session to let everyone know that the club are still on track. Benjamin Sesko is likely to be followed to the Premier League by Xavi Simons, so Leipzig will be going back to Red Bull basics of youth and dynamism, with new signings Yan Diomandé, Johan Bakayoko and Rômulo supplementing the 20-year-olds Antonio Nusa and El Chadaille Bitshiabu.
And what of Dortmund? Niko Kovac worked miracles in lifting them into the top four in the home strait of last season, but there has been little chance to build on that; from their participation at the Club World Cup shortening their holidays, to the purse strings being tightened by events as wide-ranging as paying off the last year of Sébastien Haller’s lucrative deal and an estimated €10m refit of the club’s corporate kitchens. Jobe Bellingham’s arrival underlined Dortmund’s enduring reputation as an elite finishing school but Kovac will need to ease off his infamously demanding physical regime if the CWC is not to come back and bite them.
Eintracht Frankfurt might be the most undercover of all dark horses. After cashing in on Hugo Ekitiké, their status as master traders under their sporting director, Markus Krösche, is no longer a secret. But they are already a couple of steps ahead. Having signed the Germany striker Jonathan Burkhardt as a more-than-capable Ekitiké replacement, Frankfurt enter the Champions League far better equipped than they did two years ago, with a good defence and with options up front.
The two promoted teams, FC Köln and Hamburg (the latter after a seven-year absence), are significant additions to the Bundesliga, introducing two huge derbies to the schedule, with Köln-Borussia Mönchengladbach and HSV against St Pauli must-watch moments of any season. The Volksparkstadion leg of the latter is in the second week, helping the season off to a bang.
Those early weeks promise to be key. We are waiting for a real contender to inconvenience Bayern to emerge in the season’s opening stanza. In the meantime, the fact that Wirtz is no longer a Bundesliga player, suggesting Bayern’s pulling power is no longer unmatched, may offer the greatest hope that Kompany’s team are not set for a procession to the Meisterschale.
