Bayern Munich set for summer of transition as Spanish curse in CL strikes again

In a sea of glum expressions, Sven Ulreich's was the glummest of the lot at Bayern's post-match banquet on Wednesday night.

Just a few hours earlier, it was Ulreich's howler which had allowed Real Madrid to go 2-1 up, and ultimately knock Bayern out of the Champions League.

Ulreich, whose brilliance standing in for Manuel Neuer this season has surprised everyone, did not deserve to be the villain of the piece. But then Bayern, arguably, did not deserve to lose the tie.

'We all agree that we were the better team,' said Bayern CEO Karl-Heinz Rummenigge. 'This was the best Champions League game I have seen with Bayern in the last five years.'

Undaunted by the task of turning around a 2-1 deficit in the Bernabeu, Bayern were their confident, ambitious best, and they brought Real Madrid to the brink.

But an individual error in each leg and a string of miserable luck did for them in the end. Against a team as brutally efficient as Zinedine Zidane's, that is all it takes.

'Bayern did very well, but we were more ruthless, and that's why we went through,' said Madrid's Toni Kroos. It was difficult to argue with him.

Bayern now face the familiar feeling of being knocked out in the semi-finals by a Spanish club, something which has happened to them in four of the last five seasons.

Madrid alone have eliminated Bayern three times in that period, including in last year's quarter-final.

Hopes that Jupp Heynckes could break the Spanish curse and lead Bayern to a second treble now lie in ruins. The 72-year-old will return to retirement at the end of this season. Wednesday was his last hurrah in European competition.

'Jupp thanked the players in the dressing room afterwards, it was very emotional,' said Rummenigge.

'He also reminded them that the German Cup Final is in two weeks. It is our responsibility to win the double and round off a season which will be difficult to match.'

That is the bitterest pill for Bayern, who fought back from full-blown crisis in the course of this season. Unlike in previous years, they seemed to have hit their stride at just the right moment.

Now, they are back to square one, and dramatically so. Heynckes will be gone in the summer, replaced by Niko Kovac, and the 46-year-old must make sure that the team do not slip back into the instability and aimlessness that plagued them nine months ago.

Kovac's arrival will be the start of an overhaul at Bayern. New players such as Serge Gnabry and Leon Goretzka are expected to break into the team, while the likes of Arturo Vidal and Sebastian Rudy are likely to move on.

There are also question marks over the futures of David Alaba, Jerome Boateng and Robert Lewandowski, all of whom have been linked with moves away from Munich.

Though it is unlikely that any of them will leave this summer, rumours of their departure will loom large in the coming years, particularly if Kovac makes a bad start.

The new coach, at least, can rest easy in the knowledge that superstars Arjen Robben and Franck Ribery will be around for another season, with both reported to have signed a new, one-year contract at Bayern.

Yet the big names do not always matter as much as one thinks. Against Real Madrid, it was younger, less experienced stars such as Joshua Kimmich and Niklas Sule who were among the best performers, while the likes of Mats Hummels and Robert Lewandowski struggled. On that basis alone, Bayern have little to fear for the future.

This will be, though, perhaps the biggest period of transition at Bayern since Louis Van Gaal was replaced by Heynckes in 2011.

A new generation is beginning to emerge, and they will have to prove that they too can reach the last four of the Champions League as regularly as Bayern's current crop have done in the last five or six years.

Maybe, at some point, they might even break the Spanish curse. Niko Kovac will be under heavy scrutiny throughout next season.

For his team as for Heynckes, however, the biggest test of all will come in the spring, on nights like Wednesday, in arenas like the Bernabeu.