Severance payments, transfer flops & co. – How FC Bayern burned a lot of money

FC Bayern is still in an excellent financial position. However, costs have recently got a little out of hand. The new management now wants to get this under control.

The current lack of sporting success is costing FC Bayern hard cash at the moment. But it’s not just the loss of some of the income from the DFB Cup and the Champions League in recent years that is costing the club dearly.

With Thomas Tuchel, Julian Nagelsmann, Hansi Flick and Niko Kovac, FC Bayern has worn out four coaches in the past five years. With the exception of Flick, who wanted to take up the job as national coach after one year, all of them were dismissed prematurely.

Thomas Tuchel alone is rumoured to have received a severance payment of around ten million euros for the termination of his contract. A sum of 1.5 million euros was agreed with Julian Nagelsmann, which is almost negligible compared to his transfer fee of 25 million euros at the time. Not to be neglected is the fact that Niko Kovac’s salary also had to be paid after his dismissal in November 2019 until the end of the season.

Many transfers and few titles

In order to put an end to the lack of sporting success, especially internationally, a transfer fee of 95 million euros was paid for a player in the summer of 2023 for the first time in the history of the Bundesliga: Harry Kane moved from Tottenham Hotspur to FC Bayern. Although the England captain regularly proves his world class in the Bundesliga, he is facing the threat of another title-less season and his club’s first since 2012.

The costly signing of the Englishman is therefore by no means the reason for the lack of sporting success at the Isar. The origins lie far deeper, with the tenures of Hasan Salihamidzic and Oliver Kahn in particular still causing the German record champions problems to this day – simply due to the severance payments that have to be paid to the former sporting directors. Kahn is said to have received between four and five million. Salihamidzic between six and eight million euros.

The two also made several expensive mistakes with transfers. With signings such as Sadio Mané (32 million euros), Marcel Sabitzer (15 million euros) and Ryan Gravenberch (18.5 million euros), which all flopped, the Bavarian management was forced to pull the ripcord at some point.

Max Eberl wants to clean up

It is not only in the case of Alphonso Davies that the new sporting director Max Eberl does not want to be toyed with. The 50-year-old wants to reduce the guaranteed basic salaries in the squad. In his opinion, there are apparently too many top earners who are paid in the region of 20 million euros a year.

Although FC Bayern does not have to worry about financial ruin, too many more years of wastefulness would damage even the Bavarian fixed deposit account in the long term. There is a lot for the new sporting management to do.