“Are you serious? Why? Just why? Now we know Bayern won’t be getting a trophy this season. Kane needs a friend. Thank you for taking him, love from north London.”
This was the kind of thing that Eric Dier would have seen on his Instagram page on 11 January – were he inclined to read the comments. The centre-half had posted for the first time as a Bayern Munich player, after his transfer from Tottenham, and it should be said that most of the messages were positive, Spurs fans thanking him for his nine and a half seasons with them, wishing him well for his next challenge.
The problem with social media is that the haters punch with disproportionate force. And goodness knows Dier has felt it. Rewind to last summer and a photograph he uploaded from his wedding day, of himself and his wife, Anna, glowing with happiness. “Please leave my club. Go out now!!”
It takes a special person to get behind the keyboard and type such words although, in Dier’s position, it surely pays not to psychoanalyse too deeply. Suffice to say he has needed his thick skin and for it to have become thicker over the years.
Dier is not deaf to the abuse. He has a clear idea of how he is perceived in England. He feels there is a lack of appreciation for his career and it probably relates to him having stayed at one club for so long. As the former Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger said: “We live in a society of news.” In other words shiny new things.
There is the way Dier plays – his calm and undemonstrative style, which is possibly at odds with the ideal of the chest-beating English centre-back. Also, his lack of pace, which is definitely jarring in the Premier League, where speed in every position appears to be the only thing a player cannot live without. It is the easiest flaw to ridicule. Just ask Manchester United’s Harry Maguire.
When Dier went to Munich he had barely played for Spurs over the first five months of the season: one start, three substitute appearances. Some of the scepticism was understandable, even if the manner in which it was articulated left much to be desired. Why were the mighty Bayern taking a Spurs cast-off?
It has only made Dier’s revival sweeter; why it is one of the comebacks of the season or, indeed, any other. Because as Bayern prepare for Wednesday night’s Champions League semi-final second leg against Real Madrid at the Bernabéu – the score level at 2-2 – Dier will be the first centre-half on Thomas Tuchel’s teamsheet.
It is appropriate to track the story via Dier’s Instagram feed, to see how the tone has shifted, the trolls shooed back into their bedrooms. After he had starred in Bayern’s Champions League quarter-final elimination of Arsenal their silence was golden, the comments on Dier’s post after the second leg essentially echoing the song that the Spurs fans used to sing about him. “I love Eric Dier. Eric Dier loves me.” There were references to how “agent Dier” had done Arsenal over, to what an underrated player he was.
Dier was also solid defensively and composed on the ball in the first leg against Madrid but then he has been so throughout his time at Bayern, seizing his opportunity when it came and establishing himself alongside Matthijs De Ligt and ahead of Dayot Upamecano and Kim Min-jae.
For Dier, January was a whirlwind. He signed for one of the biggest clubs in world football, turned 30 and became a father for the first time. His bolt from fourth choice to first in Tuchel’s central defensive pecking order has been just as dizzying. Guess what? There is room at the elite level for a strong-arm defender, who is commanding in the close-quarter one-on-ones, good in the air and reads the game instinctively.
Dier has never doubted himself and the key to his adaptation at Bayern has been the belief that he belongs there, alongside Manuel Neuer, Joshua Kimmich and Thomas Müller. He has been struck by their innate confidence, that of the club as a whole; how winning is the only option. It has chimed with his competitive nature. He loves it.
Bayern had tried to sign Dier last summer and, when they did get him, it was on an initial loan until the end of the season, although if/when he made three starts, it would trigger an additional year. The transfer fee has been about £3m. Dier has started 16 of a possible 21 games and Bayern are expected to open contract talks with him after the season ends because he could sign a pre-contract with another club in January.
Spurs wanted Dier to leave last summer; they were aware he had no intention of extending a deal that was set to expire in June this year. He felt they tried to force him out. Ange Postecoglou removed him from the squad’s leadership group and the new manager did not see a role for him in his high defensive line, where the emphasis was on recovery pace. As an aside, Spurs conceded 1.66 goals per league game last season with Dier a mainstay of the team. The figure is exactly the same this time out.
Dier has no axe to grind with Spurs or Postecoglou. He prefers to look ahead and that includes to Euro 2024, which will be played in Germany. Dier has been stuck on 49 England caps since the Qatar World Cup, an annoying number, so close to a landmark, and he is determined to win a recall for the finals.
Gareth Southgate named six centre-backs in his last England squad: the first choices John Stones and Maguire plus Ezri Konsa, Lewis Dunk, Joe Gomez and Jarrad Branthwaite. Marc Guéhi and Levi Colwill were injured. Apart from Stones and Maguire, no one has Dier’s experience. And, at the risk of starting the obvious, none of them are playing in the Champions League semi-finals.
More immediately, Dier has a different sort of England return in his mind because the Champions League final will be staged at Wembley. Bayern knew what they were getting with him. Could there be even more?
