Nagelsmann goes on charm offensive after Sule links to Chelsea
Stefan Bienkowski
- 28 Sept 2021 16:55 BST
- 3 min read
Bayern Munich’s season couldn’t be going better, as the German champions sit top of the Bundesliga table with a three-point gap over their rivals.
Five wins and a draw from their first six league games can only be bettered by an impressive victory over Barcelona in the Champions League two weeks ago, as Julian Nagelsmann has quickly got to work in Munich.
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It certainly seems as though the young head coach is settling in well at Bayern and has now turned his attention to one of the club’s biggest concerns this season: Niklas Sule.
The towering central defender is one of the few first team players in Nagelsmann’s squad that has a contract which expires at the end of the season. And with reported interest from Chelsea, it remains to be seen whether the Germany international will stay or go next summer.
However, rather than concern himself with the player’s potential departure, Nagelsmann was in an optimistic mood when it came to Sule and expects the defender to develop into a new player over the course of this season.
"I know what potential he has, I also know what building blocks he has and had," Nagelsmann said ahead of his team’s Champions League clash with Dynamo Kiev.
"He is taking a good development and doing it professionally, also the trappings. He still has an unbelievable amount of steps, so that if everything runs normally, you won't recognise Niki in three, four months as he was half a year ago."
Will Sule leave Bayern next season?
If it sounds like Nagelsmann is applying the charm offensive on Sule then that’s probably because he is.
The Bayern head coach’s comments echo similar compliments after a recent 3-1 win over Greuther Furth, when Nagelsmann said Sule belongs on the “top shelf” of defenders in Europe.
Whether the Bayern tactician’s remarks are a sign of an imminent contract renewal or simply a move to try and encourage Sule to stay in Germany remains to be seen.
