Bayern left to beat Haifa and hope

FC Bayern München go into their Matchday 5 fixture against Maccabi Haifa FC with their destiny no longer in their own hands.

• After home-and-away defeats by FC Girondins de Bordeaux, Louis van Gaal's men have slipped to third in Group A – four points behind second-placed Juventus. All they can do now is defeat Haifa and hope that Juventus fail to beat Bordeaux in the other group game in France.

• Haifa travel to Bavaria still seeking their first points after their own successive losses to Juventus left them out of the running at the foot of the table. Four points adrift, they retain a slim hope of finishing third and claiming entry into the UEFA Europa League but must beat Bayern to keep that ambition alive.

Previous meeting
• Bayern won the teams' first ever encounter at the Ramat Gan Stadium on Matchday 1, prevailing 3-0 through goals from Daniel Van Buyten (64) and Thomas Müller (85, 88).

Match background
• Bayern go into the match looking for the first home goal of their campaign, having recorded blanks in a stalemate with Juventus and a 2-0 loss to Bordeaux.

• Elisha Levi's visitors have even bigger problems in front of goal – they are the only team of the 32 participating in the group stage yet to find the opposition net.

• Bayern have made it through to the last 16 in their five previous attempts. The last time they failed to do so was in 2002/03 when they finished bottom of their group with just two points.

• The Bundesliga club will hope for a repeat of their one previous home encounter with Israeli opposition – a 5-1 UEFA Champions League victory against Maccabi Tel-Aviv FC on 23 November 2004. Claudio Pizarro, Hasan Salihamidžić, Torsten Frings and Roy Makaay (2) found the net that night for a Bayern side that included current squad member Bastian Schweinsteiger with Martín Demichelis and Michael Rensing unused substitutes.

• Haifa's only previous visit to Germany brought a 2-1 loss at Bayer 04 Leverkusen in the 2002/03 group stage. Nenad Pralija scored the goal for a Haifa team that featured both Alon Harazi and Yaniv Katan, the latter as a substitute, with Bayern custodian Hans-Jörg Butt then keeping goal for Leverkusen.

• Haifa, who also lost at home to Leverkusen, eventually finished third in that maiden group-stage campaign.

Team ties
• Bayern's Miroslav Klose scored a 15-minute hat-trick against Israel in a 7-1 victory for Germany in Kaiserslautern in February 2002.

• Harazi and Haifa's technical manager Adoram Keisi both featured in that Israel team, Keisi starting at left-back and Harazi coming on as a late substitute.

• Bayern's Philipp Lahm, Mario Gómez, Schweinsteiger and Klose appeared for Germany in a 2-0 win against a South Africa side that included Haifa defender Tsepo Masilela in a friendly in Leverkusen in September this year. Gómez scored the opening goal.

• Bayern duo Ivica Olić and Danijel Pranjić helped Croatia earn a 1-0 home win against an Israel side featuring Haifa's Nir Davidovitch and Eyal Meshumar in qualifying for UEFA EURO 2008™.

• The last Israeli club side to visit Germany were Hapoel Tel-Aviv FC, who lost 4-2 at Hamburger SV in a UEFA Europa League group-stage game last month.