Coming to an agreement with Gabriel Vidović in the summer was difficult for Bayern Munich. Having already gone on two loans, there were murmurs that the Croatian was unwilling to go to a temporary home for a third time. Still, in the end Bayern were able to renew the forward’s deal and Vidović left on loan to 1. FSV Mainz 05.
Unfortunately, nothing worked for Vidović at Mainz as he was left out of the matchday squad five times, thrown to the wolves against Bayern in the DFB Pokal. Regardless of the ankle injury he suffered that kept him out, Mainz simply never gave him a chance. Therefore, Bayern saw fit to end his loan.
“Gabriel Vidović is a very talented forward who we hold high hopes for at Bayern. Unfortunately, he didn’t get the playing time we’d hoped for in the first half of the season at Mainz, so we’ve agreed together with the player to terminate the loan early,” Bayern Munich sporting director Christoph Freund said via Bayern’s official website.
The website also provided these stats:
The Augsburg native has worked his way through all of Bayern’s youth teams since joining in 2016 and took the step up to the reserves in 2021/22, scoring 21 goals in 33 appearances. The Croatia U21 international (21 caps, two goals) made his senior Bayern debut in April 2022 and has played four times for the first team. Vidović gained experience at Dutch club Vitesse in 2022/23 (25 games, four goals), while he spent last season on loan at Dynamo Zagreb in Croatia (40 games, nine goals).
Clearly, it is too soon to write the hugely talented Vidović off. It will be interesting to see how he is integrated into the squad.
