Said El Mala has burst onto the scene at FC Köln and he's quickly become a transfer target for several top clubs across Europe including Bayern Munich. His profile has been compared to that of Lennart Karl and Jamal Musiala with his pace, dribbling abilities, and finishing, but he's his own player and, by the looks of things, has quite a high ceiling ahead of him.
Bayern kicked off the tournament in a rather rusty fashion, as they found themselves trailing 3-1 to Juventus in their opening game. However, because Bayern have made a habit of comebacks nowadays, they came back in style to win 4-3. Ribéry, Sebastian Rudy (remember him?), Mandžukić, and Mark van Bommel scored the goals. The second and last group game pitted the hosts against Eintracht Frankfurt.
Among tactical implementation, developing players and dealing with the media, keeping a healthy dressing room atmosphere is one of the most important roles for a football manager. Managers can be strong tacticians but a failure to keep the dressing room under control could lead to total collapse-something Vincent Kompany's predecessors, Julian Nagelsmann and Thomas Tuchel, learnt the hard way. In contrast, the 39-year-old Belgian manager is capitalizing on his emotional intelligence to find the perfect balance at Bayern Munich.
Breaking through at Bayern Munich as a youth player is exceedingly difficult. Lennart Karl may have made it look easy, but usually one has to compete with an array of stars as an academy player to get game time. Felipe Chavez is in a fairly similar boat. He caught the eye with a bright display in the big 5-0 friendly against RB Salzburg before making his Bundesliga debut against VfL Wolfsburg.