Ralph Hasenhüttl feels Bayern Munich managers are put under far too much pressure

In a recent interview with Spiegel Online, current Southampton and former RB Leipzig manager Ralph Hasenhüttl said that he feels Bayern Munich managers are unfairly put under far too much pressure to succeed. Hasenhüttl was asked about his past comment that he was not yet ready to coach Bayern. He said, in his view, that coaching Bayern makes sense only as the last step in one’s coaching development:

I absolutely stand by what I said then. FC Bayern is something like the knighthood for every coach in Germany. But it only makes sense when it’s probably the last step in one’s own development, because not much else bigger than that can come afterward. That sidesteps the question of whether FC Bayern is really a desirable goal for a coach.

Spiegel naturally asked Hasenhüttl to clarify what he meant by that last statement. He said,

What does a Bayern coach have to win before he wins the recognition that he deserves? The double? We recently learned with Niko Kovac that that is not enough. The Champions League? Is that enough, so that people say, “But he’s doing a good job!”? And does he get time to develop things?

When Kovac’s departure from Bayern was officially announced, opinions were split amongst fans and pundits alike as to whether or not that was the correct decision for the club. Much like his first season in charge (2018/2019), Bayern had experienced a handful of poor results in the beginning stages of this season and it seemed as if the Croatian had lost the full belief from the majority of players in the squad. Not to mention, Kovac had to deal with a long list of injuries in the beginning of the season, which didn’t make his job any easier. It seemed as if everything was stacked against him, despite winning a domestic double in his first season in charge.

Photo by Alex Grimm/Bongarts/Getty Images

Bayern isn’t the only club where the pressure is always increasingly high either in the Austrian’s eyes. Spiegel noted how Pep Guardiola is also in the midst of criticism at Manchester City for failing to win the Champions League. Hasenhüttl remarked,

That’s how it is now at the absolute top teams. Success is taken for granted; failure, a catastrophe. Every coach has to decide for himself whether he can live with that or whether he would like to go a different way.

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