Hoeness: Wealth changes motivation, former team legends no longer want to join Bayern s senior management

Hupu November 24 News Beckenbauer, Hoeness and Rummenigge, these three former Bayern players have controlled the direction of Bayern Munich for decades. But why are there no new former Bayern players entering the senior ranks today? Hoeness gave his own explanation for this.

73-year-old Hoeness said in the podcast: "Today's players play football for ten years, earn an annual salary of 15 million, and have 60 to 70 million in their accounts. They have no pressure to continue to work hard, and there is no motivation to fight to maintain family wealth. This is the biggest problem."

Hoeness said that when his playing career ended at the age of 27 due to injury in 1979, he knew very well that he had to work hard in order to continue to maintain his original standard of living. So he joined Bayern as a manager and later founded his own sausage factory. Today, the situation is completely different. Hoeness believes that this is also related to Germany's higher social welfare standards.

Hoeness said: "We have an overall sense of satisfaction here. So many young people, they don't even have the will to try their best to become professional players. They all want to become professional football players, but they don't want to work hard enough for it. This is of course a problem. You have only one way to succeed, and that is to work hard unconditionally.

After the end of the era of Hoeness and Rummenigge, Kahn served as Bayern CEO from July 2021, but was fired due to internal conflicts within two years. He was later succeeded by Dresen, a professional banker. Hoeness said Drayson has done a great job, but added that bringing a club legend back to the top remains a dream.

Hoeness also revealed that a few months ago he asked Schweinsteiger if he wanted to come to Bayern to take on a team management role. However, Schweinsteiger's first reaction was: "Do I have to come here every day?" When Hoeness replied "yes," the 2014 World Cup champion declined.

For Muller, Bayern even proposed that after the end of his contract, the club would pay for him to travel around the world for a year, let him inspect big clubs such as North America, and then return to Bayern to enter the management. But Muller's answer was: "It's not the time yet." This fan-favorite legend has now joined the Vancouver Whitecaps and is competing for the MLS title. Bayern also still looks forward to Muller's return one day in the future.

Muller maintains Bayern's historical appearance record with 756 games, Kahn ranks second with 632 games, Neuer ranks sixth with 576 games, and Neuer will surpass Beckenbauer's 584 games this season. Bastian Schweinsteiger left for Manchester United in 2015 after playing his 500th game for Bayern. Kimmich currently plays 462 times for Bayern and has a contract until 2029. If he stays healthy, he has a chance to break into the top three in team history.