Over the last five seasons, Bayern Munich have been utterly dominant in the Bundesliga.
Traditionally the strongest club in Germany in any case, the record champions had responded to the challenge posed by Borussia Dortmund in particular after the 2011-12 season by not only signing their rivals' players but also bringing in Pep Guardiola as head coach and winning league title after league title.
The experienced and multiple Champions League winning Carlo Ancelotti led them to a fifth title in a row last season but this campaign, there appears to be signs of discontent and decline.
Defeated by Hoffenheim only a couple of weeks ago, the loss had significance beyond the capture of zero points, amid under par performances.
Hoffenheim's manager Julian Naglesmann, who is just 30 years old, is the bright young face of German football management and is expected to become Bayern coach in the near future.
And with uncertainty around Ancelotti's position, those murmurs are growing a little louder as we discussed with The Guardian's Bundesliga expert Rafa Honigstein.
"For Bayern, there is a sense that Ancelotti's time in Munich has not really resulted in the team perhaps utilising the maximum of their potential," Honigstein explained.
Hoffenheim's coach Julian Nagelsmann celebrates the victory after the German Bundesliga soccer match between 1899 Hoffenheim and Bayern Munich at the Rhein-Neckar-Arena in Sinsheim, Germany, 9 September 2017. Photo: Hasan Bratic/dpa
"He is a manager in the real sense of the word. He manages this team. Does he develop them? Does he really coach them? Does he take them anywhere near the sort of levels of football that we've seen under Guardiola? No. To a certain extent, Bayern knew that before but they were still I think taken aback a little bit by just how hands off and laissez faire this regime has been. As long as everybody's winning, that's not an issue but as soon as the first result goes against them, that's when the faultlines become a hot topic and that's when the veneer of harmony starts chipping away."
A few players have grumbled about their own places in the team and transfer window activity, although Honigstein explained that the players seemed to an extent enjoy Ancelotti''s approach in a similar sense to a "schoolteacher that doesn't give a lot of homework" in comparison to the more obsessive approach used by Guardiola previously.
Meanwhile, with the almost equally tactically obsessive Nagelsmann's star rising as uncertainty grows around Ancelotti, he's being linked with Bayern.
"Nagelsmann is being increasingly seen as a once in a lifetime, generational coaching talent in Germany," said Honigstein of the young coach, who took Hoffenheim from relegation worries to the Champions League in the space of just over a year.
"To be in control of such a dressing room at such a young age and getting them to buy into your methods, I think shows that he can be one of those rare talents that has both the tactical know-how and the ideas but also what is crucial in football is the ability to bond with players and create a unity and togetherness. I think Bayern are to an extent afraid if they don't appoint him fairly soon, he could go to another club - to Dortmund for example who wanted him in the summer - or abroad and that they'll miss out on the best German manager just as they did with Jurgen Klopp."
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