Thomas Müller voted Player of the Month for January!

- in Bundesliga

Bayern Munich’s resident Raumdeuter assisted three goals in January, as well as setting up 11 more chances.

This season once again the Bundesliga will be officially recognising outstanding individual performances with the Player of the Month award. The award, created by the DFL Deutsche Fußball Liga in 2018/19 in cooperation with the Bundesliga’s official licensing partner, EA Sports, is decided through a two-stage selection process that considers both the players’ individual performance data and a vote by fans and experts.

January winner

Thomas Müller (Bayern Munich)

Much like teammate Lewandowski, Thomas Müller appears to be getting better and better with age. The 32-year-old, who topped the assist charts in the previous two seasons with 18 and 21 respectively, leads the way once more this term with 16 to his name – three of which arrived in January. His tally leaves second-placed Florian Wirtz (nine assists) well behind in the ranking. Furthermore, the attacking midfielder set up a teammate to shoot 11 times in January, the third-highest total in the league.

Müller scored his sixth goal of the campaign in the 4-1 win over Hertha BSC on Matchday 20, meaning he has been directly involved in 22 league goals in 2021/22. Only Lewandowski, with 24, has more. “His assists over the last few years and especially this season are extraordinary,” said Bayern coach Julian Nagelsmann recently. “When someone has so many assists it shows just how much of a team player they are.” There is no doubt that Müller remains an absolutely indispensable part of the Bayern side.

>> Click here to enter for the chance to win exclusive prizes, including an in-game FUT item from the Player of the Month.

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Other candidates for January:

Robert Lewandowski (Bayern Munich)

Almost every month is a good month for Robert Lewandowksi. At 33, the FC Bayern München forward is in the form of his life, and was the league’s sharpest shooter in January with four goals in three Bundesliga games. That included a hat-trick away to 1. FC Köln, his 14th treble in the Bundesliga. Furthermore, in that game the Poland international struck his 300th Bundesliga goal, making him just the second player in history after Bayern legend Gerd Müller to reach the milestone.

January was a memorable month for Lewandowski for another reason too: he won the prestigious The Best FIFA Men’s Player Award for a second successive year, this time beating off competition from fellow finalists Lionel Messi (Paris St. Germain) and Mohamed Salah (Liverpool). “I feel very honoured, proud and happy,” said Lewandowski, who also thanked his teammates: “It’s an award for everyone around me.” A team player with individual brilliance – it does not get any better than that.

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Patrick Wimmer (Arminia Bielefeld)

The powers that be at Arminia Bielefeld are undoubtedly well aware that they have struck gold with Patrick Wimmer. On Matchday 20 the 20-year-old Austrian, who joined the club from Austria Vienna last summer, served up his best party trick yet. In his side’s 2-0 victory in Frankfurt, not only did Wimmer score the opening goal but he set up Alessandro Schöpf for the second with a rabona cross. “I didn’t trust my left foot in that situation,” Wimmer said afterwards. “So I either had to hit it like that, or cross it with the outside of my right boot. Thankfully it turned into an assist.”

It was his fourth assist of the season; nobody else at Bielefeld has more than two this term. Wimmer was the decisive player for coach Frank Kramer’s side in January, firing off nine shots and setting up colleagues for a further nine – both team-high metrics. He also averaged 56 touches of the ball per game across the month, an extremely high number for a winger.

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Erling Haaland (Borussia Dortmund)

Erling Haaland ended two mini goal droughts in January. Prior to the home game against SC Freiburg, he had gone two consecutive Bundesliga games without scoring for the first time this season. His response was to hit a brace against the south-western club. One week later Dortmund travelled to Hoffenheim, with Haaland goalless away from home in the team’s last three road trips. Once again, the Norwegian responded in style and netted the opening goal for BVB. If he had not sustained a muscular injury and been substituted off in that match it would have been a perfect month for the forward, who helped his team win all three games at the start of the second half of the season.

Haaland also set a new record in January – although that is nothing new for him. In the 3-2 win over Hoffenheim the 21-year-old registered his 56th Bundesliga goal (in his 57th game), making him the youngest and quickest player in Bundesliga history to reach that tally: Klaus Fischer was the previous youngest at 22, while Timo Konietzka was the previous quickest with 67 matches. “I try to enjoy what I do and to laugh a lot,” said Haaland after being voted into the FIFA World 11 in January. It is a strategy that has served him remarkably well so far.

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Josko Gvardiol (RB Leipzig)

There can surely be no better present for a footballer than to score an important goal on your birthday – and Josko Gvardiol did exactly that when he turned 20, firing in RB Leipzig’s second to cap a 2-0 success over VfL Wolfsburg. The Croatian is by no means an attacking player – he is a mainstay in the Leipzig rearguard – but he now has two league goals this season and took aim with four shots in January. Only Andre Silva (eight) and Christopher Nkunku (five) had more efforts on goal throughout the month.

Gvardiol also excels at his day job in defence. In January he won 51 per cent of all his duels, averaged a team-high 98 touches of the ball per game, and only committed one foul. No wonder, then, that he has remained a first-team regular under head coach Domenico Tedesco, just as he was under his predecessor Jesse Marsch. In a recent interview, Gvardiol explained his recipe for success: “During the week I’m completely focused on what we need to do and on what the coach says, and I work hard with the team every day.” He may have only just turned 20, but Gvardiol is already a pillar of the Leipzig team.

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Moussa Diaby (Bayer 04 Leverkusen)

Considering Moussa Diaby has been producing consistently top-class performances for Bayer 04 Leverkusen for over two and a half years now, it comes as something of a surprise to learn that on Matchday 20 this season, in his 78th Bundesliga game, the Frenchman scored more than one goal for the first time in Germany’s top flight. He even hit a hat-trick in the 5-1 demolition of FC Augsburg. The jet-heeled winger now has eight league goals this season, a new personal best. “He’s improved enormously and has become more stable overall in his play,” said sporting director Simon Rolfes of the 22-year-old.

“With my pace I can create a lot of space and I often play decisive passes,” said Diaby recently, before outlining an area of improvement: “I can still get better in my defensive work.” That desire for improvement is one of the main reasons why Diaby has consistently advanced his trade during his time in the Bundesliga, culminating in his hat-trick in January. If he continues in the same vein, the sky is the limit.

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Previous winners

December 2021: Patrik Schick