Bayern Munich wanted to delay the start of the Bundesliga

If Karl-Heinz Rummenigge had his way, the Bundesliga season would not start on August 22. The Bayern Munich CEO would start the season on August 29, if given the chance, so the players returning from the World Cup would have a little bit of extra rest. Unfortunately for Bayern, the rest of the Bundesliga clubs disagreed.

According to Bild, Rummenigge put in the request months ago at a gathering of club managers. It was dismissed.

"The reason for that is that they saw it as their only chance to cause Bayern any problems. I would like to see a bit more solidarity among the clubs who sent a lot of players to the World Cup. Dortmund also sent eight or nine players."

Bayern sent eleven players to the World Cup, and nine of them played the max number of possible games. The World Cup Final was on July 13. The Bundesliga will kick off less than 40 days later. Obviously, that isn't a lot of time for 1) a break after the World Cup and 2) to return to training to prepare for the upcoming season.

FCB finished ahead of Borussia Dortmund by 25 points in the 2012-2013 season and by 19 points in the 2013-2014 season. So, you can see why the rest of the league would want Bayern to "come back to earth" so to speak. It's not so much a malicious thing by the other clubs to not allow this extra week, but it does seem to be rather silly to not want to give your "World Cup Heroes" an extra couple of days to recover from winning your nation a world championship.

The first game of the Bundesliga isn't the first "competitive" game of the season for Bayern, however. The club will take on Borussia Dortmund in the DFL Supercup on August 13 and Preußen Münster in the first round of the DFB Pokal on August 17. It will be interesting to see what kind of lineup that Pep Guardiola fields in these matches and if he will have a full squad at his disposal.