Does Boateng’s return to Bayern make any sense at all?

At one time, Jerome Boateng was one of the best central defenders in the world. He won every trophy he could with Bayern Munich and was one of the cornerstones of the German national team that won the 2014 World Cup. He left Bayern in 2021 and there is now intense talk of his return.

A few days ago, Boateng trained with the Bayern players who have not played since the start of the match against Leipzig at the weekend. Immediately, speculation began that his return to Bayern was in talks. Thirty-five-year-old Boateng is currently a free agent.

The club has only briefly commented on the whole thing. It announced Boateng’s involvement in training, adding that he will continue to train at the club’s training centre. Now his return, at least in the form of a short-term contract, seems very real, as reported by Fabrizio Romano among others.

At first glance, it might seem like a smart move from Bayern. Considering the failed end of the summer transfer window, which left the squad rather narrow, and the uncertain health of Matthijs de Ligt, it would be a low-cost solution that would help the club fill the gaps in the defence at least until the winter transfer window.

The signing of Boateng also reportedly has the backing of coach Thomas Tuchel, who was interested in the former Germany international when he led Paris Saint-Germain.

However, the first impression is deceiving and if we take a closer look at the whole situation, we can’t find much sense in his possible return from Bayern’s point of view, on the contrary, Bayern can only harm themselves.

From a footballing point of view, the signing of a quality senior player would make sense given the narrow squad. He wouldn’t come on regularly or in key games, but he would help reduce the match load of the primary central defenders, i.e. Upamecan, de Ligt and Kim, while also acting as some insurance in case one of them gets injured.

In Boateng’s case, however, the fact that he played only 35 competitive games during his two-year engagement at Lyon, with whom he signed as a free agent after his contract at Bayern expired, is alarming from a playing perspective, the vast majority of which he played in his first season. In the first half of the second season, he mostly did not play due to injuries, and in the second half he even lost his place in the starting line-up for performance reasons.

So the question is whether Boateng will stay healthy and possibly whether he still has the performance to match a club like Bayern, otherwise it would make more sense to give a talented reserve team player a chance in an emergency.

The non-sporting side of the whole matter is Boateng’s conviction for domestic violence in November 2022, when he was only fined €1.8 million (the prosecution at the time unsuccessfully called for an 18-month suspended prison sentence as well).

Bayern Munich has always presented itself, and still does, with the slogan ‘Mia San Mia’, which is not just a motto for the club, but expresses the club’s identity, i.e. ‘we are what we are’ and do things differently, in our own way, on the basis of certain principles and values with which the club identifies and which it considers to be correct.

The identity of “Mia San Mia” is shared and emphasized especially among the most ardent fans, which is why one can often see in Südkurve (i.e. in the cauldron of the home fans in the Allianz Arena), banners expressing various attitudes and criticisms are seen, with the targets being most often UEFA, other clubs (especially RB Leipzig), the club’s management itself (such as during the negotiations for a partnership with Qatar Airways) and sometimes even individual players (most recently Noussair Mazraoui for supporting a national team teammate who refused to wear rainbow colours in support of the LGBTQ+ community).

Thus, engaging the convicted Boateng will not only go against the values to which the club publicly subscribes and expresses its very identity, but will certainly be met with significant opposition from fans and public criticism.

Of course, it must be added that the main goal of any club management is success, on and off the pitch. It is then up to the individual officials to sacrifice certain values for success, whether they openly espouse them or not. In the case of Bayern and Jerome Boateng, however, the balance between what Bayern sacrifices and what it gains is very unbalanced.

If Boateng does return, it will be a hypocritical move by Bayern, smacking of desperation, contrary to the way the club presents itself, which will almost certainly provoke a considerable wave of criticism from both its own fans and the wider public.

It will be yet another complication that the club certainly doesn’t need at the moment – things are not looking good at all from a playing perspective under Thomas Tuchel and there is no progression to speak of.

At the same time, the contracts of several key players are due to expire in the next two years and due to the spring earthquake in the club’s management, negotiations for new contracts have not yet been opened with the players in question and the negotiations already started have been suspended and have not yet been renewed.

So protests and public criticism and the resulting pressure on both players and club management is the last thing the club needs right now. A player who hasn’t moved the team anywhere in terms of play and has spent the last season wasted or sitting on the bench is definitely not worth it.

In conclusion, it is worth noting that if Bayern really needed to bring in an older experienced central defender after the transfer deadline, there were at least two up for grabs – Sergio Ramos and Leonardo Bonucci. Both are at least as experienced as Boateng, performing at a higher level and the latter would meet one of coach Tuchel’s main requirements for a central defender – after all, few active players have as good a long-range passing ability as Bonucci, who now plays for Union Berlin.

Source: Bavarian Podcast Works, dw.com, transfermarkt.com, fcbayern.com, Fabrizio