Julian Green: "I am not thinking of a loan"

Julian Green returned to Bayern Munich's preseason training on Thursday, and that is where he wants to be. The 19-year-old will fight for his spot in the team.

"Anything is possible, but I am not thinking of a loan," he said in an interview with Goal. "I am thinking only of FC Bayern and I want to play for this club."

"My goal is to play for the first team, and it's up to me. I need to train well and trigger my performance in the games, then the decision is up to the manager."

Pep Guardiola wants Green to stick around, saying that "he deserves to try to keep going here and play with us." The American's performance in last year's preseason impressed the first-year manager, and he rewarded his second-team success with his first top-flight appearance against CSKA Moskva.

Green is currently a weed amongst bean stocks; Bayern currently have six options in attack  – Mario Götze, Robert Lewandowski, Thomas Müller, Franck Ribery, Arjen Robben, and Xherdan Shaqiri – presumably ahead of Green in the depth chart. Breaking into the first team is a challenge that Green is not going to shy away from.

"Of course it is hard. Bayern is one of the best clubs in the world, but that is football" he said. "We have great players and all of them want to play. Everyone must always give their best in every practice and wait for what happens."

With the recent egresses of Emre Can and Alessandro Schöpf, Green appeared to be the next in line to seek a developmental departure. Can and Schöpf played two years with the reserves though, while Green has just played one.

The United States international will be part of Bayern's tour across the Atlantic, where the Rekordmeister will play against Chivas Guadalajara on July 31 and the MLS All-Stars on August 6. With his return to full training, he might also be eligible to play in this weekend's Telekom Cup in Hamburg.