Official: Tymoshchuk leaves Bayern for Zenit

The experienced midfielder has made the decision to leave the treble winners for the Russian giants as he returns to familiar grounds

Zenit St Petersburg have announced on their official website that they have secured the services of Anatoliy Tymoshchuk from Bayern Munich on a free transfer. The holding midfielder has signed a two-year deal with the Russian giants.

Luciano Spalletti was keen to add some more experience to his squad ahead of next season and the Zenit coach sees the 34-year-old Ukrainian as the ideal addition.

Tymoshchuk previously wore the Zenit jersey from 2007 until 2009 before making the move to Bayern.

The midfielder had since made 132 official appearances for the Bavarians, winning two Bundesliga titles, two DFB-Pokals and the Champions League in the process.

His contract with Bayern expires at the end of this season and he has made the decision to return to the club where he won the Uefa Cup in 2007-08.

Tymoshchuk started his professional career at Volyn Lutsk and also wore the Shakhtar Donetsk jersey before joining Zenit in 2007 for his first spell at the club.

Heynckes: Lahm, Schweinsteiger, Ribery & Muller are Ballon d'Or favourites

The outgoing Bavarians coach believes four of his players are in the running for the award following their treble-winning season

Outgoing Bayern Munich coach Jupp Heynckes has tipped Franck Ribery, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Thomas Muller and Philipp Lahm to vie for the 2013 Ballon d’Or.

Barcelona attacker Lionel Messi has taken home the award in the last four years but, following the Bavarians’ treble-winning season, the veteran German trainer believes his players deserve to recognised.

“I think the Ballon d’Or is between Philipp Lahm, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Franck Ribery and Thomas Muller,” he told reporters on Sunday.

“For me, these are the four candidates who must clean up this year.”

Bayern won the DFB-Pokal final 3-2, surviving a late fightback from Stuttgart in Berlin to complete the unprecedented German treble.

They lifted the Champions League in May with a 2-1 win over German rivals Borussia Dortmund thanks to a late Arjen Robben strike, having wrapped up the Bundesliga in early April.

Heynckes, who is being replaced by ex-Barcelona boss Pep Guardiola this summer, has been linked with a return to Real Madrid recently, with Jose Mourinho having parted ways with the club.

Beckenbauer: Sammer deserves most credit for Bayern treble

The Bayern Munich great hails the influence of the club’s sporting director, attributing a large share of this season’s historic success to him

Franz Beckenbauer has expressed his belief that Matthias Sammer has been the defining factor in Bayern Munich’s treble-winning success.

The legendary midfielder replaced Christian Nerlinger as the club’s sporting director in the summer and the 67-year-old feels he deserves to be saluted.
 
“Without detracting from anyone else, [Sammer] has the largest share of the success,” he told Sky.

“He came into a situation where the team and the club were on the ground. I have said from the beginning: the best commitment in recent years was from Matthias Sammer.

“He has raised up the team again, of course, in conjunction with Jupp Heynckes and his men. Sammer has had a very big role in ensuring that Bayern are today where they always wanted to be.”

Beckenbauer went on to say that coach Heynckes also deserved to be saluted for motivating the players across the course of the season.

“There is this respect towards older people,” the Roten legend continued.

“Jupp Heynckes was a world class player, he is a world class coach – that the players know and because they have respect for it. They do not want to disappoint him, the players wanted to give him the best in the last game.”

Bayern secured their treble on Saturday with a 3-2 DFB-Pokal final win over Stuttgart, with Mario Gomez scoring twice for the Bavarians.

Mourinho and Chelsea can rule England again, insists Robben

The Dutchman believes the Special One can recapture former glories in west London with the right backing from Roman Abramovich, and is unsurprised Frank Lampard is staying

Arjen Robben believes Jose Mourinho and Chelsea can once again rule English football, once the Portuguese boss completes his imminent return to Stamford Bridge.

Last month Goal revealed Mourinho has agreed to return to the club where he won back-to-back Premier League titles, a League Cup and an FA Cup in three years.

And Robben insists that, with the right backing from owner Roman Abramovich, the Special One can re-establish the Blues as the dominant force in the Premier League.

“It is a big move for Chelsea with Jose coming back – but I know it is one the fans will welcome,” the Dutchman told reporters.

“He had very successful years at Chelsea – and he can have them again. The thing about Jose is that he will win at any cost – he doesn’t care how, he just wants to win.

“I’ve not always been supportive of the style of football he plays, but he is a winner who has achieved great success.

“I am sure that with some big signings from the owner that Jose and Chelsea can rule England again.”

Robben is also unsurprised by the fact that Frank Lampard has committed himself to one more year at Stamford Bridge after lengthy and, at times, tortuous contract negotiations.

“It is no surprise to me that Frank is now staying,” he added.

“It can not be for football reasons that he was going – because he is still one of the best – it must have been a personal thing with the old coach.

“As soon as it became clear Jose would return, there was never any chance Frank would go because there is such respect and friendship between the two of them.

“He sent me a text after we won the final – that is the sort of classy guy Frank is.”

Forget about your tiki taka – Guardiola can't lose unless he changes Bayern's style

The Spaniard must not rock the boat at the Allianz Arena when he takes over in July or risk failing to live up to expectations in Germany

COMMENT
By Enis Koylu

How do you improve a near-perfect team? When Pep Guardiola arrives at Bayern Munich in the summer to succeed Jupp Heynckes, he will inherit a side who have won the lot – and in remarkable fashion.

Saturday’s DFB-Pokal final victory over Stuttgart brought to an end a fantastic season. Their statistics are, frankly, ridiculous – they lost one Bundesliga game all season (due to a late own goal against Bayer Leverkusen), dropping just two points after Christmas; they even beat Barcelona 7-0 over two legs in the Champions League.

As it stands, Bayern are a winning machine. Regardless of whether the likes of Bastian Schweinsteiger or Anatoliy Tymoshchuk are in the starting XI, the Bavarians have won this season.

They visited Hannover – a team who boast a proud home record – with just a handful of first-choice players and won 6-1. They met Borussia Dortmund, the beaten Champions League finalists, five times across the season without suffering defeat.

Quite simply, nothing needs to be changed. And yet Bayern made their bed by springing for Guardiola in the fear that they would follow up last season’s disappointment with another collapse. It seems obvious that they would offer Heynckes another deal now, given the chance.

Juppilee | Heynckes has turned Bayern into the best team in the world

Over the course of the last 12 months, the 68-year-old has addressed every deficiency in his team. Luiz Gustavo was considered insufficient for a team with pretensions of European glory, so Javi Martinez was brought in to great effect, having a fantastic influence in his side’s new-found stability.

Mario Gomez, despite scoring 80 goals over the course of the previous two seasons, was unceremoniously dropped in favour of Mario Mandzukic, who was able to do what the German never did – score in the Champions League final.

Those associated with the club will never want it to end, but on July 1 Guardiola’s reign begins.

And he must not change things radically. Mario Gotze‘s arrival has already been confirmed from Borussia Dortmund, but the 20-year-old will be more than able to play in Bayern‘s current system without anything more than a change in personnel, should he play in his preferred No.10 role.

Of more concern will be an overhaul of Bayern‘s system. Guardiola‘s tikitaka style at Camp Nou saw the Catalans dominate Spanish and European football for years, but the Blaugrana were humbled by Bayern‘s hard-running and incisive counterattacking as recently as April.

Schalke and Dortmund, the next-best teams in Germany, will certainly fancy their chances of beating a Barcaesque Bayern by employing similar tactics. Pep, however, will be aware that he does not have the benefit of players who have a lifetime of playing the system behind them.

Another pressing worry will be the deployment of Martinez. Guardiola‘s admiration for the Basque midfielder was well known and he was widely linked with a move to Camp Nou prior to his switch to the Allianz, due in part to his ability to play centre-back.

Pep’s penchant for playing midfielders at the back has seen Sergio Busquets and Javier Mascherano deployed at the heart of defence, to some success, but he must resist the temptation to do the same at Bayern with Martinez, who has proved the perfect foil for Schweinsteiger.

Meanwhile, the possibility of playing him in a 3-4-3 alongside two central defenders would be a disaster. Bundesliga teams, for the most part, have quick incisive wingers, who would expose this with ease.

Another mooted experiment is playing Mario Gotze as a ‘false No.9’, where Guardiola unleashed Lionel Messi with brilliant consequences, but this would be a huge gamble, one the Spaniard is unlikely to take. While he has played there to some success with his country, a foregone conclusion against Kazakhstan is a very different proposition from a Champions League clash with Europe’s finest.

“It’s simple. All Pep has to do is win every game, then no-one will say anything!

Uli Hoeness

Bayern president Uli Hoeness has acknowledged that Pep has a hefty task on his hands but remains confident that the Spaniard will succeed: “All he has to do is win every game, then no-one will say anything!” he joked in March, before adding: “I can guarantee that Pep will have no problems with us, we are on the same wavelength.”

Hoeness might claim such an understanding, but he recently admitted that he had to talk the new trainer out of a move for Neymar, given the club’s recent problems with Brazilians who move straight from their homeland to Germany.

But, unless Guardiola tries to to reinvent the wheel and tinker with a winning formula, he should be able to continue the Bavarians’ winning cycle. His reign should be a natural progression, not a revolution.

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