Official: Hasan Salihamidzic to join Bayern’s executives in July 2020

Bayern Munich will decide today whether sporting director Hasan Salihamidzic will be promoted to one of the club’s executives. More specifically, the board be deciding if he will become “executive director of sport,” a position that outranks an ordinary sporting director and which would have seniority over that position (Kicker).

Currently, the board of FC Bayern München AG is still headed by Uli Hoeness, since he doesn’t officially step down from his post as club president until November 15th, this Friday. Hoeness will be the one who formally proposes Salihamidzic’s promotion to the other eight members of the board. Herbert Hainer, who will succeed Hoeness as Bayern’s new club president, is also a strong proponent of Brazzo’s promotion.

If Salihamidzic in fact receives the promotion, it would be incredibly significant with respect to his influence on the club and some of the important decisions they have to make, especially on the transfer market. Salihamidzic has previously admitted that the decision is beyond his control, but Hoeness recently defended on Sport1’s “Dopplepass” program for what he felt was unfair criticism of sporting director. The public perception that a lot of people, especially the German press, have of Salihamidzic, is completely inaccurate according to Hoeness.

Salihamidzic unfortunately has always shouldered the burden of comparison to Matthias Sammer and his tenure as Bayern’s sporting director from 2012 to 2016. Salihamidzic was responsible for bringing in Alphonso Davies, Benjamin Pavard, and Lucas Hernandez to Bayern, who have all proven to be crucial signings for the club. In his new role, he would continue to oversee the squad, planning for the youth teams, and transfers.

Any transfer decision that exceeds the €25 million mark would still have to be assessed and approved by Bayern’s supervisory board.

UPDATE: The supervisory board votes in favor of promotion

It is official! Hasan Salihamidzic will join Bayern Munich’s executives, rising in rank comparable to Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, Jan-Christian Dreesen, Andreas Jung, and Jörg Wacker. In an official statement, the club said,

At today’s session, the executive board of FC Bayern München AG took up the personnel question concerning Hasan Salihamidžić. Hasan Salihamidžić has been sporting director of FC Bayern since the summer of 2017 and has done outstanding work during this time. This is true not only of the professional area, where he has been partly responsible for the competitive success of the past years, but also for the promotion of the youth players in FC Bayern’s youth performance center. The supervisory board therefore intends to extend its collaboration with Hasan Salihamidžić and promote him to executive on July 1, 2020.