For several weeks now, we've been in countdown mode. No one seriously doubted that Bayern Munich would become Deutscher Fuballmeister for the 33rd time since the formation of the Bundesliga in 1962, and it was more a matter of when the arithmetic would make it impossible for Bayer Leverkusen to catch them.
The day finally arrived with Germany's most successful club tasting success as Sofa-Meister (couch champions) without kicking a ball. Or more accurately, celebrating as a group on Sunday at the Kfer restaurant in desirable Bogenhausen, an upscale area in the Bavarian capital.
On Saturday, the party proper will commence in front of 75,000 at the Allianz Arena against Borussia Monchengladbach. The coveted Meisterschale will be presented by the DFL and countless celebratory Bierduschen (beer showers) will rain down on players and club officials, which should serve as a reminder to anyone due to be in the vicinity, not to wear their favorite clothes to the Meisterfeier (champion celebration).
The occasion will be particularly resonant for two members of the Bayern squad. We often throw the word "legend" around too liberally for it to do justice to someone like Thomas Mller.
The recently released documentary film about him entitled "Einer wie Keiner" ("One of a Kind") encapsulates what Mller means to a football club that also serves as something of a cultural force in Bavaria. It is rare for a top-level player to spend an entire career with just one club, and while Mller -- whose contract hasn't been renewed by the Rekordmeister -- may elect to play on somewhere else, his legacy along with true Bayern greats like Franz Beckenbauer, Gerd Mller, Sepp Maier and Karl-Heinz Rummenigge is secure.
This will be Mller's record 13th Meisterschale lift and his 34th major honor for club and country, which places him level with Toni Kroos. In more raw emotional terms, Saturday will represent his final bow at a stadium that has been his own football stage for the entirety of a special career. The young lad from Weilheim who first emerged with the first team under Jrgen Klinsmann in 2008 is now -- 502 Bundesliga matches later -- the football figure most people imagine when they think of the modern Bayern Mnchen.
Although they quickly became friends when Harry Kane joined Bayern, Mller and the England captain are opposites, both personality wise and in terms of medals and silverware.
Kane is happy to let Mller take center stage in the quips department while doing his talking with the football. I confess that while I have always rated Kane, I perhaps underestimated just how professional he is until his arrival here in Germany.
You get the feeling every working moment is dedicated to making this wonderful footballer the best he can possibly be for his team, and that is absolutely not lost on anyone at the Sbener Strasse, Bayern's HQ. That Kane on Saturday will finally get to lift a major trophy, in this case die Meisterschale, is a spectacle anyone who loves football and has a generosity of spirit will applaud to the rafters.
The season is not quite over, but I feel it is nevertheless an appropriate time for an Einschtzung (assessment) of this Bayern team under Vincent Kompany.
The Kompany factor is an important one. Sporting CEO Max Eberl is often heard to say that it was Glcksgriff (a stroke of luck) for Bayern to have landed the likable Belgian, and this argument has some strong content to it.
Kompany has become the weekly face of Bayern, a pleasant and empathetic human being who doesn't try to convey an all-knowing presence. Instead, you get the feeling you're watching someone who was a terrific and successful player, develop into a very fine coach. He's not the finished article, but that's not what Bayern were necessarily seeking. They saw potential in Kompany -- style of football, German speaker, personal qualities -- and he simply ran with the opportunity when other more prominent names were running away from the job.
When players talk about the positive spirit in a dressing room, and established stars like Joshua Kimmich contrast this with previous Bayern seasons, you sit up and take notice.
Some will say Kompany has done just the bare minimum in his first season in charge. After all, the Bundesliga title is generally to be expected and last season's fall to third felt like an aberration. What about failure in the German Cup and UEFA Champions League, though?
Without making excuses, I think eight times out of ten, Bayern would have probably won their December DFB-Pokal meeting with Leverkusen. Manuel Neuer's early red card made life difficult against an accomplished team, but even then, Bayern dominated the game before the sucker punch courtesy of Nathan Tella.
In the Champions League, while the season-long dream was to get to the final dahoam (at home) in Munich, I'm not sure the squad was complete enough from top to bottom to allow Bayern in their current guise to call themselves one of the best teams in Europe. Their defensive performances were frequently uneven -- think Celtic in the playoff round, against whom they were mighty fortunate -- and they lacked and continue to lack genuine leaders at the back.
Once injuries took hold, depriving Kompany of Alphonso Davies, Dayot Upamecano and the versatile and unfortunate Hiroki Ito, it was going to be an uphill climb in Europe's premier club competition. Not a lot of the blame can be placed at the coach's door.
So rather than briefings against Kompany from the Tegernsee (read: Uli Hoeness), the man who faces the pressure is in fact Eberl. Is the squad being assembled the right way? Was the handling of Mller's departure the right one? Did he overpay to re-sign Davies at a time when Bayern are trying to trim playing staff costs?
The experienced Eberl has only been in the post for 15 months and not everyone is thrilled with the job he is doing, even though at Bayern you often feel there has to be someone to whine about no matter the results trajectory.
I agree with Kimmich when he describes this Bundesliga season as a "very good one." It's not going to go down in the annals of history as anything to rival the 2012-2013 famous treble-winning campaign under Jupp Heynckes or the tactical masterclass era under Pep Guardiola.
But what Bayern wanted from Kompany after the turmoil of Thomas Tuchel's time in charge was a move away from friction and a return to coaching steadiness as well as, of course, a return to winning the league.
Kompany's football has been pleasing enough on the eye and he can take especially great pride in the way he has enabled Michael Olise to quickly become one of the key men, the first player this season in the Bundesliga to hit double figures for assists and goals.
Since the third week of the season, Bayern have been on top, and while Leverkusen missed several good opportunities to pile on pressure, most notably in the 0-0 direct duel in February, Bayern have gone out and won this Meisterschale rather than claiming it through the back door as occurred at the expense of Borussia Dortmund two years ago.
In time, Kompany will be expected to deliver more than just the league title, but right now, he can reflect on a job well done at one of the most ruthless addresses in world football.
