It’s taken a while but Leroy Sane finally appears to be back to his brilliant best.
The Germany winger, who left City to join Bayern in a £55million deal last summer following almost a year out with knee ligament damage, scored twice as the Bundesliga giants dismantled Benfica 4-0 in the Champions League on Wednesday.
City scouts were reportedly in attendance, heightening speculation the Blues might move for Benfica’s highly-rated striker Darwin Nunez, and there will have been knowing nods when Sane unleashed a “knuckleball” free-kick that flew into the net to open the scoring 20 minutes from time.
The 25-year-old completed the rout in the 84th minute, concluding a stunning Bayern blitz and banishing memories of home supporters booing him in Munich when he was hauled off at half-time against Cologne just two months ago.
He already has eight goals and six assists in all competitions this term, rapidly closing in on the 10 and nine he registered respectively during a 2020/21 campaign where he struggled for consistency.
Sane in full flight is a joy to behold, his combination of grace and athleticism exactly what you’d expect from the son of a former professional football and an Olympic medal-winning gymnast.
Alongside those genetic gifts bestowed by his parents, Sane has no doubts over the key formative influence of his career.
This week he told t-online.de: “That time left a strong mark on me, and I still benefit from it today. [ Pep Guardiola ] practically reprogrammed me on a tactical level in Manchester.
“It was about the tiniest details, every movement and how every space could be used perfectly.”
Alongside all the hours of work on the training pitches of the City Football Academy, this reprogramming operation increasingly seemed to play out in real-time on the touchline towards the end of City’s domestic treble-winning 2018/19 season. It was certainly no secret within the squad.
“That is a victory for everybody but especially for Leroy. You know how critical I am with him,” Guardiola told his players after Sane came off the bench to seal a vital 2-0 derby win at Old Trafford.
It would have been easy for Sane to become exasperated by being the focus of Pep’s unwavering attention, but if time has allowed him to appreciate that tutelage the same can certainly be said for his current employers.
When Guardiola arrived in Munich for the 2013/14, he was still bathed in the glow of his imperial period at Barcelona - his genius largely unquestioned in the days before “Fraudiola” and all of that.
The first murmurings against his pre-eminence took hold in Bavaria. Bayern won the Bundesliga in each of Guardiola’s three seasons in charge but could not add another Champions League, meaning they never matched the treble-winning exploits of his immediate successor Jupp Heynckes.
Positional play and repeated, methodical playing patterns might have been the Guardiola way or the Barcelona way, but it certainly was not the Bayern way. The club's prominent grandees rarely missed an opportunity to point this out.
One of the few upsides of a humiliating 4-0 Champions League semi-final defeat to Real Madrid for Pep was that it meant he would never doubt his principles again. Nursing a 1-0 first-leg deficit, he bowed to player pressure to adopt a more attacking, vertical style and Carlo Ancelotti’s Madrid put them to the sword.
Ah, yes. Ancelotti. The kindly, grandfatherly Italian coach was selected as Guardiola’s successor when he headed to Manchester. Initial noises from Bayern spoke of a more relaxed atmosphere, with players liberated by the removal of all that Catalan intensity.
They retained the title under Ancelotti but soon things started to resemble a group of prodigious children acting up under a supply teacher. A Champions League thumping at Paris Saint-Germain spelled the end for Ancelotti in a competition he had once made his own.
After Heynckes returned to steady the ship as caretaker, Bayern gradually moved back towards the course Guardiola charted for them. Niko Kovac might have underwhelmed, but Hansi Flick returned them to the top of the European game with a ravenous high-pressing approach.
Now they are hitting their stride under Julian Nagelsmann, a coach who has far more in common with Guardiola than any notion of Bayern’s old-school traditions
“For me he is the best coach in the Bundesliga, a great tactical coach, I think he is a young Pep Guardiola,” German football journalist and former Mainz footballer Guido Schafer told City Is Ours last month ahead of City’s Champions League match with RB Leipzig, who Nagelsmann left to join Bayern after last season.
“He told us he loves Pep’s style. It’s quite a similar style, he wants all possession like Guardiola.”
Bayern, like Sane, learned it was worth going through short-term change and pain for long-term gain under Guardiola’s imperious guidance. He has reprogrammed both of them.
