Lewandowski bounces back from Ballon d'Or heartbreak by outscoring Haaland with Der Klassiker winner

Stefan Bienkowski

• 4 Dec 2021 14:39 CST
• 4 min read

Robert Lewandowski responded to his Ballon d’Or defeat to Lionel Messi in midweek in the only way he knew how: scoring goals.

On Saturday evening, Bayern Munich travelled to Borussia Dortmund knowing that anything but all three points would galvanise their league rivals, who sat just one point below them in the Bundesliga table.

That task was made even harder five minutes into the game, when Julian Brandt picked up the ball in the Bayern box, dinked by Alphonso Davies, and fired it into the back of the net. The visitors were certainly up against it.

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However, in typical fashion, Lewandowski set about dragging his side back into the game and when Thomas Muller latched on to a poor pass from Mats Hummels to play the Poland international through just four minutes later, the Bayern striker didn’t waste a moment by tucking the ball into the back of the net.

By half time, Bayern were in full control of the game. A deflected shot from Kingsley Coman had nestled into the roof of the net just before the break and Julian Nagelsmann’s side looked good for all three points.

Lewandowski v Haaland

Then, as is often the case in the Bundesliga, Erling Haaland decided that it was time for him to score a goal. And when Jude Bellingham squared the ball to the Norwegian striker on the edge of the box just after the restart, Haaland simply looked up and casually curled it round two Bayern defenders and into the top corner of Manuel Neuer’s goal.

Once again, Lewandowski was called upon to swing the match back into Bayern’s favour. And he was offered another perfect opportunity in the 77th minute, when Hummels was deemed to have handled the ball in the box and Bayern were awarded a penalty.

To no real surprise, the Bayern striker casually stepped up, stopped in the middle of his run up and comfortably fired the ball into the bottom right corner. Despite Dortmund keeper Gregor Kobel getting two hands to the shot, he was unable to force the ball off course and watched it nestle into the back of his net.

At the end of a difficult week, Lewandowski not only dragged his team to a title-defining win but also outscored his main rival in the goal-scoring charts in one fell swoop. Not a bad response from the world’s best striker.