Champions League final: Bayern players told to seize ‘historic opportunity’

Heynckes, who led Real Madrid to victory in the competition in 1998, said it was his job to give both a sense of urgency and of composure in his players.

Bayern Munich are the first team to benefit from home advantage since the Champions League was inaugurated in the 1992-93 season. The last time a team played at home in a European Cup final was in 1984 when the visitors, Liverpool, beat AS Roma on penalties after a 1-1 draw at Rome’s Stadio Olimpico.

Only Real Madrid, in 1957 and Inter Milan, in 1965, have lifted the European Cup in their home stadium.

“It is an historic opportunity. We will never relive it again, to play the Champions League final in our home stadium,” said the 67-year-old coach, in his third stint at Bayern.

“We could lift the trophy for the first time in 11 years. Real’s win [in 1998] was 32 years after their last one. This is a great opportunity for us and I need to drive it through to my players.”

Heynckes, however, warned that the hosts had only a “tiny” advantage over their English rivals by playing at home. “I do not share the euphoria that Bayern are the favourites. Chelsea is a team with players who have won everything at a domestic level and want to win the big prize now,” he added.

Chelsea lost in the final to Manchester United in 2008, while Bayern were runners-up two years later to Inter Milan.

“What we should do in the final is continue our very good home run in this competition. But we only have a tiny advantage of playing at home.”

A victory tonight for Bayern, who have won all seven home games in the competition this season, would make Heynckes the fourth coach, after Ernst Happel, Jose Mourinho and Ottmar Hitzfeld, to have won the top European club prize with two different teams.

“I think it is my task through my long experience to transfer a sense of composure and calmness to my players,” he said at a press conference last night. “Tomorrow will be a dramatic game as both teams are in search of success.”

What Heynckes would not like to experience this evening are penalties, despite Germans generally enjoying a good record against English sides when it comes to spot kicks.

“I hope we can avoid that. It would be our third match with penalties this season and at my age I do not know if my heart can take it,” said Heynckes, blushing and laughing out loud.

Bayern needed penalties to oust Real Madrid in the semi-finals and also advanced in the German Cup with a spot kick victory over Borussia Moenchengladbach. Heynckes, however, ruled out practising penalties before the final. “It does not make much sense to train for penalties and I do not think we should do it. They have nothing to do with talent,” he explained.

“It is the mental strength that helps a player score a goal.”

One of Bayern’s key goal threat’s in tonight’s showpiece will be Franck Ribery who gets another chance to go for the biggest prize in European club football two years after missing out on a Champions League final.

Ribery was suspended for the 2010 final when Bayern lost to Inter Milan 2-0 and his team-mates hope the France winger will prove to be the difference this time around.

Bayern captain Philipp Lahm and midfielder Bastian Schweinsteiger say Ribery could turn out to be key to a victory that would give Bayern their fifth title and their first in 11 years.

Lahm thinks this time the France winger will be highly motivated, especially since Bayern are playing at their own stadium. “We’ve all learned from 2010. We were an attacking team and we were punished. Ribery could be the decisive player tomorrow. He could make the difference,” Lahm said.

“Many of our players were in the final in 2010, we’ve developed since then. Now, we are much more confident, we know that we can win this game,” the Germany defender added.

Schweinsteiger also thought Ribery could be the decisive player. “He is an excellent player who can make the difference,” said Schweinsteiger, another of eight Germany internationals on Bayern’s team. “We hope to get through the early minutes without conceding a goal and we want to impose our own game. When we look at the home games in the Champions League this season, we’ve dominated them.”

Bayern have won 14 of their last 15 Champions League matches, including seven straight at home, while Chelsea have only one win on the road this season. Speaking a day earlier, Ribery said the team will muster every last bit of energy to keep that good form up and bring home a trophy that may have seemed destined for Bayern ever since their stadium was chosen as the venue for the final.

“Lose? That’s not possible. And if we are dead after the game, then we are dead,” he said. “We must not even think about it [defeat]. If we win the Champions League, then we can forget about not winning the league or the cup, nobody will care about that.”