Robert Lewandowski claimed a hat-trick as defending champions Bayern Munich brushed Werder Bremen aside with a 6-0 win in Friday’s opening match of the new Bundesliga season.
Lewandowski, the league’s top-scorer last season with 30 goals, could have finished with five as Bayern ran riot.
“I am just happy I scored and that we got the win,” Lewandowski said, adding that he finished the game with a hole in his goal-scoring right boot.
Photo: Reuters
After Xabi Alonso scored the first goal of the season at Munich’s Allianz Arena, Lewandowski netted either side of the break before Bayern captain Philipp Lahm added a fourth.
It was no more than shooting practice for Bayern by the time Franck Ribery fired home, with Lewandowski then converting a penalty to claim his third and Munich’s sixth.
Having also hammered Hamburg 5-0 in last season’s opening game, this was another emphatic win as Bayern look to win a fifth Bundesliga title in a row.
They were 2-0 at the break, but could have doubled that as Lewandowski and then Thomas Mueller both hit the woodwork in the opening 45 minutes.
Bayern won last season’s German league title by 10 points, making history with their fourth straight Bundesliga title.
They picked up under new coach Carlo Ancelotti where they left off under Pep Guardiola, who left in May to coach Manchester City, with long periods of possession.
“I am very happy. That was a very good performance from my team,” Ancelotti said after his first Bundesliga game.
“We got off to a good start and took control of the game early on,” he said.
Bayern’s win came with Germany defenders Jerome Boateng and Holger Badstuber, plus Dutch winger Arjen Robben all recovering from injury.
New signing Renato Sanches from Benfica, a Euro 2016 winner with Portugal, started on the bench.
Germany defender Mats Hummels, their other new arrival from Borussia Dortmund, partnered Javi Martinez at centerback.
The defending champions needed just nine minutes to take a spectacular lead.
Alonso’s volley from just outside the area found the top right-hand corner and flew past Bremen goalkeeper Felix Wiedwald.
The hosts doubled their lead just four minutes later.
Ribery’s long-range pass down the left put Lewandowski in behind the defense and the Poland hot-shot tucked his shot past Wiedwald from the tightest of angles.
He could have claimed a first-half hat-trick.
Muller’s long-range shot slammed off the post, then Lewandowski hit the crossbar and had a shot saved before the break.
The pair combined for Bayern’s third goal, which arrived just 39 seconds into the second half.
Mueller’s curling cross was met at the far post by Lewandowski for his second on 46 minutes.
Bremen’s last win over Bayern in Munich was back in 2008 and they were barely in it as Bavarians enjoyed about 70 percent possession.
Lahm grabbed Bayern’s second when he converted Mueller’s final pass before Ribery blasted home their fifth with the Frenchman unmarked in the area.
Rafinha came on for Lahm and when the Brazil defender was fouled in the area, Lewandowski drilled home the resulting penalty on 77 minutes.
It was his second hat-trick in exactly a week after he netted three in Bayern’s 5-0 romp at Carl Zeiss Jena in the first round of the German Cup on Friday last week.
A sumo star was born in Japan on Sunday when 24-year-old Takerufuji became the first wrestler in 110 years to win a top-division tournament on his debut, triumphing at the 15-day Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka despite injuring his ankle on the penultimate day. Takerufuji, whose injury had left him in a wheelchair outside the ring, shoved out the higher-ranked Gonoyama at the Edion Arena Osaka to the delight of the crowd, giving him an unassailable record of 13 wins and two losses to claim the Emperor’s Cup. “I did it just through willpower. I didn’t really know what was going
The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is being criminally investigated by the IRS, and the attorney for his alleged bookmaker said Thursday that the ex-Los Angeles Dodgers employee placed bets on international soccer — but not baseball. The IRS confirmed Thursday that interpreter Ippei Mizuhara and Mathew Bowyer, the alleged illegal bookmaker, are under criminal investigation through the agency’s Los Angeles Field Office. IRS Criminal Investigation spokesperson Scott Villiard said he could not provide additional details. Mizuhara, 39, was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday following reports from the Los Angeles Times and ESPN about his alleged ties to an illegal bookmaker and debts well
MLB on Friday announced a formal investigation into the scandal swirling around Shohei Ohtani and his former interpreter amid charges that the Los Angeles Dodgers superstar was the victim of “massive theft.” The Dodgers on Wednesday fired Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani’s long-time interpreter and close friend, after Ohtani’s representatives alleged that the Japanese two-way star had been the victim of theft, which was reported to involve millions of dollars and link Mizuhara to a suspected illegal bookmaker in California. “Major League Baseball has been gathering information since we learned about the allegations involving Shohei Ohtani and Ippei Mizuhara from the news media,” MLB