Bastian Schweinsteiger Testimonial Game

Bastian Schweinsteiger played in his testimonial soccer match for Bayern Munich this past weekend and even scored a goal, and a volley at that. The crowd chanted his name, pleading him on to score a goal and he did. A legend during his time with Bayern Munich he helped them to numerous title and a Champions League trophy as well.

Schweinsteiger will go down in German soccer as one of the greatest midfielders to play the game. Schweinsteiger played for both his MLS side, the Chicago Fire, and Bayern Munich, a half for each team for his testimonial match for the famous Germany club. He joined Bayern at the age of 13 years old, spending 17 years with the club in total. He will also go down in history with one of the more unique and fun to say names. And I’m sure there are a lot of young German kids now named Bastian.

There are plenty of Chicago Fire fans though that will miss watching Schweinsteiger play too. But the Fire still have a good team and a lot of the young players will have learned a great deal just playing and being around a player like Schweinsteiger. The Fire are a team to look out for in the furture and not a bad team to pick to win the title in the years to come.

Here’s Schweinsteiger’s goal – I almost wonder if the Chicago Fire player, his teammate, let him maybe have the chance to score. Look like it.

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I think Germany could have used him during the World Cup this past summer, even if he is much slower and at the end of his soccer career. Just having him in the team would have provided them with a lift. Plus, he was always good at controlling the tempo of the game. Taking the air out of the game when they were ahead and pushing the team for another goal when they needed it. But one soccer skill that made Schweinsteiger stand apart was how he could shield the ball and keep possession even if he was under a lot of pressure. He was an expert at using his body to protect the ball. A skill in soccer that doesn’t get enough attention or respect.

And that’s why for every club he’s played for, Bayern Munich, Manchester United, the Chicago Fire or German, he was the release valve to help their team keep the ball and get out of pressure. More than that though, he could find that killer pass that leads to a goal. While he was good at holding the ball and keeping it, he was still looking for that long pass that would lead to a goal scoring chance.

It will be interesting to see what Schweinsteiger does when his soccer playing career is over. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s involved with coaching the German national team in some way. However, I’d think that Bayern Munich would want to keep him in their system and the coaching ranks. Really, he’ll have a lot of options when he does hang up the boots entirely. It’s not clear if this is his last year with his MLS team or not, but most likely it is. Having playing pro soccer for nearly 20 years, I think he’s probably ready to take a long vacation for a while.