BERLIN: Bayern Munich suffered their first defeat of the season and their first Bundesliga home loss to Eintracht Frankfurt in 21 years when Filip Kostic drilled home an 83rd-minute goal to earn the visitors a shock 2-1 victory on Sunday.

Kostic picked up the ball on the edge of the box, charged forward and beat goalkeeper Manuel Neuer with a powerful low drive to seal Eintracht’s first win of the season and snap Bayern’s nine-game winning run in all competitions.

The Bavarians had only themselves to blame for not killing off the game earlier with a string of golden chances but remain top of the table with 16 points, ahead on goal difference of Bayer Leverkusen, who crushed Arminia Bielefeld 4-0 with two goals from Czech striker Patrik Schick.

“Defeats always hurt,” Bayern coach Julian Nagelsmann said. “And in this game that was the case as well. Firstly because it was our first defeat and secondly because it was completely avoidable.”

Eintracht, whose last league victory in Munich was in 2000 before the Allianz Arena was even built, are on eight points in 13th place.

The home side took the lead when Leon Goretzka benefited from a Martin Hinteregger mistake to score.

The Austrian defender made amends by powering a header into the net for the equaliser three minutes later.

Both teams had a chance to take the lead before the break with Eintracht’s Almamy Toure forcing a superb save from Neuer in the 43rd minute and Bayern’s Serge Gnabry hitting the post from close range a minute later.

Eintracht keeper Kevin Trapp was kept busy in the second half, repeatedly denying Gnabry, Leroy Sane and Robert Lewandowski as the hosts pushed forward in search of the winner.

Bayern were punished for their missed opportunities though when Eintracht scored what proved to be the winner against the run of play through Kostic before Trapp made another key save in stoppage time to palm a Goretzka shot wide.

Leverkusen’s Moussa Diaby opened the scoring in an entertaining first half, before Bielefeld’s Patrick Wimmer had a backheeled equaliser ruled out by VAR for offside.

Schick doubled the visitors’ lead just a few minutes later, and headed in a third after the break to put the game beyond reach. Kerem Demirbay rubbed salt in the wound with a late penalty as Leverkusen celebrated their fifth win of the season.

Nigerian striker Taiwo Awoniyi netted two against his old club as Union Berlin fought from a goal down to beat Mainz 2-1.

Awoniyi struck twice in four minutes in the second half to give high-flying Union their first away win of the season and fire them up to seventh in the table.

Marcus Ingvartsen also scored against his former team-mates to give Mainz the lead just before half-time, but it was former Mainz striker Awoniyi who had the last laugh as Union bounced back after the break.

The Nigerian levelled the scores with a cool finish on the counter-attack 20 minutes from time, and sealed the win with an almost identical goal just a few minutes later.

Published in Dawn, October 5th, 2021