The Historic Match

Owen Hargreaves has revealed he was ‘devastated’ to be dropped by Bayern Munich after helping England to a 5-1 win at his club stadium in 2001.

England had beaten Germany in the group stage of the previous year’s Euros, but when the Three Lions made the trip to Munich for a World Cup qualifier in September 2001, they had not beaten them on German soil since 1965.

There were also quite a few high profile defeats still niggling at the English psyche. Dietmar Hamann had scored the last-ever goal at the old Wembley to give Germany victory just the previous year, while England has suffered penalty heartbreak at German hands in the 1990 World Cup and Euro 96 semi-finals.

England looked set for another miserable night in Munich after Carsten Jancker put the hosts ahead after just six minutes.

But Michael Owen equalised soon after and Steven Gerrard struck on the stroke of half time to give Sven-Goran Eriksson’s side the advantage at half time.

The Turning Point

Owen made it 3-1 within minutes of the restart before completing his hat-trick on 66 minutes, with another Liverpool teammate, Emile Heskey, scoring to round off a 5-1 victory.

Having broken into Bayern’s first team the previous season Hargreaves came off the bench for his second England cap just a few minutes after Heskey got the fifth, with the Canadian-born midfielder becoming the first player to appear for England without ever having lived in the country.

Personal Impact on Hargreaves

That capped an incredible year for the then-20 year old – but also led Bayern to apply the brakes slightly on his club career, feeling perhaps that his loyalties were divided.