When Uli Hoeneß speaks, the earth shakes. This time, he revealed that he was the one responsible for blocking the transfer of Xavi Simons to Bayern Munich last summer. Apparently, both Vincent Kompany and Christoph Freund traveled to his house at Tegernsee to beg for a transfer, but the FC Bayern ex-President was resolute.
Hoeneß recounted the incident on the Podcast Auf eine weiß-blaue Tasse (via @iMiaSanMia). This was part of a wider interview where he touched on a number of relevant topics.
“Vincent
Kompany was at Tegernsee [last summer],” said Hoeneß. “He drove out there with Christoph Freund, and said: ‘Uli, we need Xavi Simons’. I had put an apple pie on the table for the meeting and replied: ‘Vincent, you can have another piece of the apple pie, but you’re not getting Xavi. We want you to play the young players’.”
“And he did exactly that.”
“We had some real disagreements within our club that summer,” added Hoeneß (via @iMiaSanMia). “There were some really big disputes because some of our people in charge wanted to spend €100-150m more for some serious signings.”
“But the older heads prevailed, mainly because we said: If you want to give the youngsters a chance, then you have to make space for them. If we buy players for €100-150m, it’s obvious that the coach would have to play them.”
In the end, it seems like the gamble paid off. Vincent Kompany has given a debut to a record number of teenagers this season, and Lennart Karl has burst onto the scene, filling the void left by absence of a more established player.
Meanwhile Xavi Simons, the main target of last summer, ended up going to Tottenham Hotspur for a deal worth around €65m. The Dutchman has struggled since the move, and Spurs currently find themselves staring down the barrel of relegation in the Premier League.
So Uli Hoeneß was right in the end. Did he just get lucky? You be the judge.
