Kane's night wasn't a curse: Dortmund's draw is the real story

Did a stadium full of speeches, a family on the pitch and a golden trophy cost Harry Kane a goal? It makes a great story. We don't buy it. The better story is the team in black and yellow that refused to lose in Munich.

Bayern held a celebration for Kane before kickoff, the first home game since he won the Ballon d'Or. Sportschau describes a stage, speeches and his family on the pitch. Then the match turned into a 2-2 draw. Konrad Laimer and Dayot Upamecano scored for Bayern, and Serhou Guirassy and Fabio Silva, in the 89th minute, scored for Dortmund.

Kane's night went badly. He hit the crossbar from the penalty spot in the 55th minute, put another effort off the post in the 76th, and shot just wide in the 78th. Sportschau also reports an expected-goals tally of 4.83 to 0.7 in Bayern's favor.

Don't blame the ceremony, blame the finishing

The tidy version says the ceremony distracted him. Maybe it did, but nothing in the reporting says so. It's a narrative we are projecting onto three bad finishes. Those numbers point to variance. A team that creates 4.83 expected goals and scores twice is mostly unlucky, and one that hits the woodwork three times is not being punished for anything.

What we do think is fair is that the evening handed Dortmund a script. Sportschau notes that Kane stayed in the tunnel with his trophy before coming out to the big stage. In our view that staging was the club's call more than Kane's. A ceremony before the biggest game in the Bundesliga is a gamble on emotion, and a draw is the price of losing that gamble. We would still argue the players paid for it less than the staging did.

There is also a cost that has nothing to do with Kane. According to dpa as published by Badische Zeitung, Ismael Saibari and Serge Gnabry went off injured after about half an hour, and Michael Olise later. Sporting director Max Eberl called it a "teures Unentschieden", an expensive draw. Jamal Musiala, Luis Díaz and Manuel Neuer were already missing. Once Olise went off in the 84th minute, Bayern had no substitutions left. Sportschau says that did not become a problem, so we won't pin the draw on it. Still, we think it is a warning sign for a squad this stretched.

Dortmund's point is the one that matters

Dortmund came back twice. Coach Niko Kovac said the team showed mentality, hunger and focus, and that it earned the point. We agree, and we'd go further. The first-half disallowed goal and the Laimer strike, which came after a Felix Nmecha giveaway, were the kind of blows that can break a visiting side. Dortmund kept playing its game. Guirassy equalized on the counterattack after Nico Schlotterbeck intercepted a Kane pass, and Silva punished a Aleksandar Pavlovic turnover late on.

Does that prove the title race is real? We'd say it's the strongest evidence so far, with a caveat. Flashscore's match report says both teams remain unbeaten and level at the top, though that page is undated, so we wouldn't lean on the exact table. Sportschau still calls Bayern the leader. What we can say with confidence is that Dortmund did not look like a team merely hoping to survive in Munich. Reuters called it a thrilling Klassiker, and it was fair to say so.

Bayern's thin squad is the story that lasts

Kane doesn't need a defense. A player who gets this many chances will usually get his goals, and we expect him to. The thing to watch is Bayern's squad. Three more players hurt, a Champions League trip to Atlético Madrid on Tuesday and a league game at Mainz four days later is a hard stretch for a team that, in our view, has few fresh options in attack.

As for Dortmund, treat this point as a statement of intent. If you were waiting for proof that the Bundesliga has a second contender, we think you got it, even if the lesson is less dramatic than the headline about a Ballon d'Or winner's bad night. Kane will have other nights. The pressure on Bayern's depth is the story that lasts.