Thiago Alcantara appears to be taking his cues from Peterborough’s Michael Bostwick.

That may sound surprising, given that one is a dependable yet limited lower-league midfielder and the other is a two-time Champions League winner.

Yet as the cliché goes, football – or more precisely, a football gaffe – is a great leveller.

You may remember Bostwick’s unfortunate pass to a steward wearing a high-visibility jacket that resembled Peterborough’s garish away strip, which was shared widely online last month.

Thiago, however, put an appropriately festive spin on the error during Bayern Munich’s 3-0 win over RB Leipzig on Wednesday by appearing to pass to ‘Santa Claus’.

When the former Barcelona prodigy turned quickly and played the ball out to his left, he knocked it in the direction of a man in his peripheral vision, wearing red and tearing down the left flank.



That man in red was not, however, one of Thiago's team-mates, but a digitised version of Kris Kringle, plowing snow on one of the Allianz Arena’s animated advertising boards.

Fortunately for Thiago, one of his actual team-mates was on hand to stop the ball trickling out for a Leipzig throw.

It may have been a moment to forget for the 25-year-old, but he left the pitch with more reasons to be cheerful.



​Thiago scored the opening goal of the night and set up the second for Xabi Alonso as a display of first-half dominance proved enough for Bayern to earn maximum points.