Monday, July 5th, 2021
New era for the record champions
Bavaria without Rummenigge – Kahn will be good
By Stephan Uersfeld
At Bayern Munich coach Hansi Flick is gone. He was replaced by Julian Nagelsmann. Oliver Kahn was responsible for the obligation of the Leipzig trainer. He has been CEO of FC Bayern Munich since the beginning of July 2021. Now he has introduced himself.
There he is now on a gigantic podium in Munich’s southern curve. The Allianz Arena is hidden behind advertising boards. It is deserted. Next to him is President Herbert Hainer. But it’s not about him. He will deliver the numbers in the next 45 minutes, but the attention belongs to someone else: Oliver Kahn, the new CEO of FC Bayern Munich. Unimaginable actually. The reds without Uli Hoeneß and without Karl-Heinz Rummenigge. Both have said goodbye. Rummenigge recently, on June 30th, 2021. The camera zooms in on Kahn. He is the new face of FC Bayern. You have to get used to it first. He says that he is convinced that he has the “necessary tools” with him. For the job in the first row, for the role of Germany’s most important football functionary, which is currently carried out on an interim basis by Hans-Joachim Watzke from Dortmund. Rummenigge and Hoeneß gone, DFL boss Christian Seifert before the jump, the DFB for years without leadership, crashed at the EM. It could be easier times for German football. Also for FC Bayern, who not only lost the leadership duo, but also ran away from the coach.
Kahn has been able to prepare for his new role over the past 18 months. He was appointed to the board in winter 2020. Since then he has looked around the club, started a project called “Ahead”, which is supposed to map the future of Bavaria, danced across the international stage with Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, made contacts and always saw how the world became complete within a few weeks has changed. Football, which survived because it defined itself as an entertainment machine, has since got by without a spectator. At least in Germany. There were only a few spectators here and only between August and the autumn lockdown in some stadium spectators. Not with Bayern. They last played in front of fans in March 2020, the last home game of the season against FC Augsburg was allowed to watch a symbolic number of invited guests.
“The biggest challenge right now is: getting the spectators back into the stadiums,” says Kahn, who has watched the world. “It’s a changed football landscape,” he says. “We can see that the financial situation of many clubs has become problematic.” Football is in motion a lot. Financial fair play, salary cap – all of these are still questions to be resolved. And then, it just goes through, he warns. “The young generation has a completely different way of watching football. We have to be prepared for that.” For Kahn, that’s the key. The spectators bring the money and they make the game. “I am convinced that the clubs that understand their fans best will do well in the future,” he said. An exciting sentence.
The goal? “Absolute world class football”
Bayern’s sporting goals are unchanged. “The ambitions have not gotten smaller,” says the new Bayern boss. True to the old Kahn motto, the sport should go “further, ever further” and the tenth national championship title in a row should be won. Now with coach Julian Nagelsmann, who will not have time. “Success at FC Bayern has to come very, very quickly,” says Kahn, saying that he is really not giving away any secrets. Nagelsmann has to become “voracious” like Bayern, develop the squad and also take a look at the Bavarian campus, from which Jamal Musiala recently made the leap into the professional squad, but who otherwise rarely produces players for the record champions. Which is not so easy with the goal of “absolute world-class football”. The young players have to deliver at the highest level. As does Julian Nagelsmann. Who has to get used to Bavaria’s culture of success. “We want to start a new era,” says Kahn. The word “era” is used more often. It is a turning point.
Internationally, things won’t get any easier in the next few years. While Bayern are losing 150 million euros in sales due to the pandemic and want to focus more on the younger generation, the clubs in the English Premier League are happily shopping, while the Qatar branch Paris Saint-Germain, driven by the longing for a Champions League victory, is also continuing to draw financially from the full. No problem for Kahn. Also in the Champions League is “absolutely” to be expected with FC Bayern Munich. “FC Bayern has repeatedly compensated for the financial disadvantages of a Bundesliga club with a strong culture of success and the ability to win”. Kahn stretches the word “ability to win”, keeps it in his mouth for a long time, continues talking. Comes back to the “ability to win” and anyway, all the money in the world has not yet led to a Champions League victory for the Parisians. That’s true. Also because the old Bavaria kept PSG small in the final in the first pandemic summer. It should stay that way in the future. But the problems are there. You are specific. A point has been reached in Munich where the club is no longer willing to go along with every player’s salary claim. Thiago Alcantara moved to Liverpool in 2020, a real veteran of David Alaba this summer. He wanted too much money, FC Bayern didn’t want to give it to him.
The future is not in the past
The problem now threatens him with Leon Goretzka, who has positioned himself as a good conscience in German football in recent months. But that doesn’t prevent the Bochum man from wanting to get a big raise in his next contract extension. Why also? Kahn, in any case, is convinced. The talks are really “very, very good” and anyway, which club could offer such a great package, he asked, citing the chance of national and international titles. At Bayern you always have the chance to “help shape an era.” But with Bayern, whose team, like every soccer team in the world, is in a state of permanent change, the question arises: If you always win everything, where does an era begin and where does the previous one end?
But there is no clearer way to delineate an era than the appearance of the new CEO of FC Bayern Munich. Karl-Heinz Rummenigge and Uli Hoeneß are now history. “Those are big footsteps,” said Kahn, “but you don’t have to keep walking in the footsteps. You can go one way or the other.” A crashing laughter resounds through the Munich arena. At the very end, President Herbert Hainer spoke up. “We all know that it is difficult to make forecasts. Especially when they look into the future.” Yes, the future is not yet written. For FC Bayern under Oliver Kahn she started today on a huge podium in an empty stadium.
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