1995/96: Klinsmann sparks Bayern triumph
Saturday 1 June 1996
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FC Bayern München (UEFA Cup Final) (©Getty Images)
Serie A's stranglehold on the UEFA Cup was broken in 1996; and it was FC Bayern München who did the damage. The Bavarian side beat FC Girondins de Bordeaux to become the first 1. Bundesliga team to lift all three European trophies.
Italian hegemony
However, Bordeaux were just as influential in ending the Italian hegemony. In a game voted France Football magazine's match of the year, they overturned a two-goal deficit to defeat Milan AC 3-0 in their quarter-final second leg at Parc Lescure. For a side that had come through the UEFA Intertoto Cup the previous summer, it was a remarkable achievement. But while SK Slavia Praha would go the way of Milan (plus Karlsruhe SC, FK Vardar, SC Rotor Volgograd and Real Betis Balompié) in the semi-finals, Bordeaux's long campaign had to catch up with them.
Klinsmann goals
Bayern's season, meanwhile, had been marred by a public row between star players Lothar Matthäus and Jürgen Klinsmann. Yet this did not stop Matthäus leading the team to a 2-1 victory at FC Barcelona in the last four after a 2-2 draw in Munich; nor prevent Klinsmann scoring a record 15 goals in the competition. The last of them came at Bordeaux in the final second leg. Bayern won 3-1 despite the presence in the home ranks of Christophe Dugarry and Zinedine Zidane. Crucially, though, the latter pair had missed the first leg at the Olympiastadion, notable for strikes by Thomas Helmer and Mehmet Scholl for Franz Beckenbauer's side.
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