5 takeaways from Bayern's first-leg win over Leverkusen | OneFootball

5 takeaways from Bayern Munich's's first-leg win over Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League last 16

This season has seen champions Bayer Leverkusen engaged in a fascinating duel with record champions Bayern Munich, with the latest instalment the 3-0 home win for the Bavarians in the Champions League Last 16 first leg on Wednesday. bundesliga.com takes you through the key takeaways from this fourth clash between the sides this season.

1) Kane can't be kept quiet for long

Bayern Munich goal machine Harry Kane may have been experiencing what some called a drought heading into the clash with Leverkusen - he hadn't struck in four matches in all competitions (three in the Bundesliga and one in the Champions League) - but the England captain proved that he has lost nothing of his almost preternatural goal-scoring instincts.

First with a strike that saw him ghost in panther-like to beat Nordi Mukiele to Michael Olise's cross and fire a bullet header past Matěj Kovář to open the hostilities. It was his eighth Champions League goal of the season but he wasn't done there, adding a ninth with a superbly taken penalty to go third on the competition's scorers chart behind Barcelona's Raphinha (nine goals) and Borussia Dortmund's Serhou Guirassy (ten).

That Leverkusen stopper Edmond Tapsoba was compelled to bear-hug the striker flagrantly enough to concede the spot-kick proved beyond a doubt that Kane's presence - and goalscoring potential - in the area is an almost unmanageable threat. It's now up to Bayer boss Xabi Alonso and his charges to find a way to muzzle the Bundesliga's top goalscorer (21 goals) if they are to stand a chance of turning things around in the return leg in Leverkusen on Tuesday.

Bayern Munich's Harry Kane celebrates one of his two strikes against Bayer Leverkusen. (IMAGO/Bahho Kara)

2) Musiala shines, Wirtz shackled

It wasn't just Kane who shone in attack for Bayern - Jamal Musiala also gave the Leverkusen defenders a night to forget, outshining Leverkusen counterpart and Germany teammate Florian Wirtz with an accomplished performance that saw him hit the bar with a powerful header early on before pouncing on a fumble from Kovář to tap in Bayern's second.

While much was made of the duel between über-talented young playmakers Musiala and Wirtz before the game, the stats told a clear story of which side was firing in attack. Bayern racked up no fewer than 17 shots (six on target) compared to Leverkusen's three (one on target). It is another area where Alonso will need to find a tactical tweak ahead of Tuesday's showdown to get Wirtz into the game.

Bayern's Jamal Musiala came up trumps in his duel against fellow Germany prodigy Florian Wirtz of Leverkusen. (IMAGO/Jerry Andre)

3) Keepers are key

The only real black spot for Bayern was the injury to keeper Manuel Neuer, who went off with a calf injury just after Musiala's goal. The club announced that the 38-year-old will be out "for the foreseeable future". That means coach Vincent Kompany is tipped to once again go with Jonas Urbig, who came on for Neuer and looked composed as he played out the final half-hour of the match.

That said, the 21-year-old, who signed a four-and-a-half-year contract with Bayern in January, was barely tested and will face a much stiffer test should he start in the return leg at the BayArena, meaning Kompany could choose to go with the experience of Sven Ulreich or Daniel Peretz instead.

Meanwhile, an unwanted spotlight fell on Leverkusen custodian Kovář after his costly mistake, and Alonso could be tempted to hand Champions League keeping duties back to Lukáš Hrádecký. However, the club captain hasn't featured in the competition since the 4-0 loss to Liverpool on Matchday 4 back in early November, leaving Alonso with a real selection dilemma.

Bayern keeper Jonas Urbig came on to replace the injured Manuel Neuer. (IMAGO/Bahho Kara)

4) Unpredictable

Although just about everything seemed to go according to plan for Bayern, the record champions haven't had it so easy against last season's league-and-cup double winners in recent meetings. In fact, the Bavarians had won none of the last six meetings between the clubs, with the record at three wins for Leverkusen and three draws.

This season, Alonso's men knocked Bayern out of the DFB Cup 1-0 in the round of 16, while in the league, both encounters ended honours even. But they were each very different matches, the competitive 1-1 draw in Munich on Matchday 5 featuring stunning strikes from Robert Andrich and Aleksandar Pavlović while the 0-0 draw in Leverkusen on Matchday 22 saw the home side dominate roundly - and hit the woodwork twice - but fail to find a way through the Bayern defence.

Such diversity of scenarios suggests that the two coaches are still trying to figure each other out, still trying to find the adjustments to make the difference. And while it seems that Kompany struck a blow in this very special duel on Wednesday night there is nothing to say that it won't be Alonso who finds a way through in the return leg.

Watch: Andrich, Pavlović score stunners in thrilling Leverkusen-Bayern draw

5) Comeback on the cards?

Any big Champions League win opens the the door to the kind of spectacular comeback that Europe's biggest club competition does like no other.

Leverkusen's three-goal deficit may seem like a mountain to climb for Alonso and his lads, and although first-leg deficits have been overturned on relatively few occasions in Champions League history, bigger peaks have been scaled before.

Most notably in 2016/17, when a Barcelona side featuring the illustrious 'MSN' trio of Lionel Messi, Luis Suarez and Neymar Jr. overturned a 4-0 first leg loss to Paris Saint-Germain with an unbelievable 6-1 return-leg victory at the Camp Nou - La Remontada - to blast into the quarters. The Catalans haven't always been on the right side of such outcomes, however, and in 2018/19 had a 3-0 first-leg win over Liverpool obliterated as the European comeback kings produced a 4-0 shut-out at Anfield to book their place in the final - which they went on to win 2-0 over compatriots Tottenham.

That same season, Manchester United also bounced back from an initial defeat in the last 16 - their first-ever at home in Europe no less - but managed to turn it around against notoriously hot-and-cold Paris Saint-Germain at the Parc des Princes. The club that stunned Bayern with two injury-time goals to lift the continent's top trophy in 1999 showed that they had more where that came from, Romelu Lukaku levelling matters with a brace before Marcus Rashford sealed the deal with a cool injury-time finish from the spot.

Which is something Alonso himself can relate to... sort of. It was the Leverkusen coach who rifled home a penalty - albeit at the second time of asking - to level it up in regulation time in Liverpool's stunning Champions League final comeback against AC Milan in 2005, so it's clear he knew of what he spoke when he said after the loss to Bayern: "It's not over until it's over. The craziest things have already happened in football and we'll fight to make something happen next week."

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