Why Bayern Munich are taking a massive gamble on Burnley's Vincent Kompany

If you’re surprised that Burnley manager Vincent Kompany has emerged as the leading candidate for the vacant Bayern Munich job, then you aren’t alone – it seems as though Bayern president Uli Hoeneß was caught off guard, too, judging by his response when first asked about the rumour.

“You journalists pull a new name out of the hat every other day,” he grumbled. “No, thank you, we are very happy with De Ligt and Dier.”

Clearly, he hadn’t got the memo that Kompany, one of Manchester City’s greatest defenders but whose managerial reputation lies largely on his first season in charge at Turf Moor, was very much an option. He certainly wasn’t the first choice, and numerous candidates have either turned them down or been discarded as options, but now it seems to be no more than a matter of the two clubs agreeing compensation.

Kompany will probably have been as stunned as anyone else to receive the call, and German tabloid Bild reports, believably, that he said ‘yes’ after five minutes. It seems eminently plausible that he only waited that long to ensure it wasn’t a prank call. He had, after all, just taken charge of a relegation season which saw his side pick up just 24 points. But have Burnley truly jumped off the high board, or is there more logic to the move than perhaps meets the eye?

Kompany’s Burnley struggled badly this year and their final position in the table told few lies – but the Belgian may point to individual struggles undermining his team’s performances. Certainly anyone who watched their 2-0 defeat at Bournemouth might have some sympathy with that view. Kompany’s side were well-drilled and kept their shape better against an in-form team, but their players fluffed their lines at every opportunity in front of either goal. If any game suggested a talented manager struggling to make anything much of a bad squad, it was that one.

After all, it was his Burnley who dominated the Championship the previous season, earning promotion with 101 points while scoring more, conceding fewer and holding more possession than any other team. Kompany completely transformed them after Sean Dyche’s departure with dizzying speed and efficacy. Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur duly considered him for their own vacancies last summer. Perhaps Burnley had simply struggled to recruit the players they needed to bridge the vast gap between top flight and second tier.

But that one game at the Vitality Stadium tells the whole story, of course, or necessarily even the lion’s share of it – and there are caveats concerning their storming of the Championship, too. For starters, those recruits who struggled so much were, in the main, Kompany’s own picks.

Burnley signed 18 players either permanently or on loan, effectively doing away with nearly the entire squad that had earned promotion, and the new arrivals were young – very young, with an average age of just 22.7. A few, like wingers Wilson Odobert and Luca Koleosho, flashed in places but struggled for consistency. Others simply struggled. Kompany gambled on youth and wound up with a side who played like strangers because they were.

Of course, at Bayern, Kompany would have rather less control over incomings and outgoings. There is a myriad array of directors at the Allianz Arena and coaches aren’t the primary decision-makers in the transfer market. The gamble, perhaps, is that if Bayern are set up in such a way that one of Kompany’s more obvious weaknesses is neutralised by default, then they will get the coach who masterminded Burnley’s promotion run in 2022/23 without the less desirable trimmings.

They also wouldn’t have to deal with another demonstrable weakness – he struggled, badly, when he had to find ways to beat better teams. Just four of Burnley’s 24 points – four draws – came against teams than finished in the top ten, and he appeared insistent on attempting to impose his preferred style, based on possession and quick passing into the front line, when a more pragmatic approach may have been necessary. His methods did not cut it.

But then, this is Bayern Munich we are talking about, a club who rarely, if ever, expected to be outmatched by the opposition. The argument in favour of his appointment continues that he has demonstrated success with one of the best squads relative to their league they were in last season, and that ultimately the promotion campaign is a much closer analogue to where Bayern expect to be next year than anything that happened before or since.

Truth be told though, all the logic there is to be found has to be looked for diligently and extracted with care. Kompany had two modest seasons with Anderlecht, one excellent season, and then one deeply disappointing one for which he has no more than passable excuses. It isn’t the stuff Bayern managers are normally made of, and you have to suspect that if he didn’t have a famous name, he would not be on the shortlist right now, less so fielding phone calls.

Still, there is logic, most of which rests with that excellent 2022/23 campaign – but as mentioned, there were a couple of caveats there too, the most substantial of which is that despite scoring a league-best 87 goals, they only did so from an xG of 66.2. That’s not a bad mark by any means, and only Sheffield United and Middlesbrough topped it, but a 20-21 goal delta between expected and actual goals indicates either some sublime finishing from his forwards which made up for deficiencies in the attacking scheme, or a colossal amount of luck. Or both, of course.

Either way, there are some indications that the job Kompany did in getting Burnley promoted, although good by any rational standards, was made to look better than it actually was. Bayern will be hoping that it’s a quirk of the statistics rather than anything more solid, and of course it was evident to anyone watching Burnley that season that they were not only ruthless in front of goal but very well set up regardless.

The long and short of it is that Kompany has not got a good enough CV for such a lofty position. There are some indications that he is a talented manager who has some key lessons to learn, and some evidence that he isn’t necessarily all he was hyped up to be 12 months ago. Either way, Bayern are taking a massive gamble on an unproven manager. Have they jumped off the high board, then? Yes, and they’re risk a nasty landing if they don’t get things right.