THE TREBLE, once an improbable dream, is now being spoken of in excited, almost expectant, tones and not just in Manchester. Bayern Munich are just as hungry as Alex Ferguson's team to create their own piece of footballing history at the Nou Camp stadium in Barcelona next month.
The way Bayern's players milked the applause from 60,000 fervent fans after dismantling Dynamo Kiev showed what it meant to Bavaria's footballing capital to edge closer to winning an unprecedented three trophies of their own in the same season.
Unlike United, Bayern are already virtually one-third of the way there. Today, they go into their highly-charged derby against Munich 1860 with a 10-point cushion at the top of the Bundesliga. Barring a catastrophic series of results, the championship is a foregone conclusion. As for the German Cup final, just as in domestic cup competitions throughout Europe it has never generated the same passion as the FA Cup. At the players' party after watching his side win it last season, Bayern president Franz Beckenbauer spoke only of his desire to regain the league title and his determination to bring home European football's greatest club prize for the first time since those three back-to-back successes of the 1970s. Even if Bayern succeed in breaking the hearts of the Old Trafford faithful next month, they will have to wait a fortnight before trying to spread the celebratory icing on the cake. The German Cup final takes place on June 12, when Werder Bremen are the opponents in Berlin.
By then, Bayern hope to have Bixente Lizarazu, their French World Cup star, back in their line-up. In the aftermath of last Wednesday, he indicated he may even be back in time to face United. Lizarazu resumes training on May 5, three weeks before the final. "The recovery is going well. I'm going to do everything I can to make it," he said.
Like most observers of the game in Germany, Rainer Holzschuh, editor of the respected football magazine Kicker, sees the European Cup final as a 50-50 prospect, with United having better technically individual players and Bayern possessing greater collective qualities. He believes 38-year-old Lothar Matthäus could hold the key. "He is playing better than at any time since the 1990 World Cup, when he was at the heart of the German midfield," said Holzschuh. These days, Matthäus is used as a sweeper, either in front or behind the defence according to the opposition. Man-to-man marking is not his greatest strength but his cool authority was there for all to see against Kiev.
Likewise Stefan Effenberg. Only 30, he has packed more into his career than most but seems to have settled down under Ottmar Hitzfeld after uncomfortable spells at Fiorentina, who couldn't put up with his temperamental behaviour, and Borussia Mönchengladbach, where the other players were jealous of his greater earnings. "Everyone here wanted to play United in the final," said Effenberg. "We were unlucky to have been drawn against each other in the same group but we were the best teams in the competition."
Arguably, Hitzfeld's biggest headache as he plots the downfall of United for the second time (he was in charge of the Borussia Dortmund side that knocked out Alex Ferguson's team in the semi-finals two years ago) is what to do about Super Mario. Mario Basler's first-half strike that secured Bayern's place in the final deserved to win any match. He is possibly Bayern's best player technically but irritatingly unpredictable.
As for Dynamo Kiev, it may be a while before we see their like again, at club level anyway. The team reputed to have the best strike force in Europe faces a difficult transition. It seemed on Wednesday that Andrei Shevchenko and Sergei Rebrov already had their minds on a future life in the west, so well shackled were they by Bayern's not always watertight defence.
Shevchenko will shortly be on his way to Milan to pick up a salary far removed from the $1,500 a month that top players earn in the Ukraine. It seems inevitable Rebrov will soon follow him westwards.
The £10m transfer fee for Shevchenko will go towards a training ground being built outside Kiev, with medical facilities said to rival the best the west can offer. Fine gesture, but it won't win the European Cup.
