Bayern Munich rules: 10.000 euros if you spit, 50.000 if you don’t drive Audi (Part 1)

In the 1990s, Bayern Munich earned the ‘FC Hollywood’ tag when the off-field antics of stars like Lothar Matthaeus and Jurgen Klinsmann made the headlines as much as the team’s success on the pitch.

With eight consecutive titles (and ninth on the way), current Bayern players are far from ’FC Hollywood’ from 30 years but that doesn’t mean they are not on the front pages or the tabloid magazines for off-the-field issues. Famous ’Bild’ managed to find out all the rules in the Bayern dressing room, prices for breaking them, and the ’council’ which is responsible for control.

It's official: Hansi Flick will leave Bayern Munich at the end of the season

There is a lot of fuss around the topic of company cars. Shareholder Audi (holds 8.33% of Profi-AG) provides the team, trainers, and bosses with an electric car fleet. Bayern's sporting director Hasan Salihamidzic banned players arriving at training in their own personal vehicles in January 2020. Kingsley Koman arrived at the training ground in a massive Merzedes jeep and was not allowed to enter the ground by security guards, and had to park his car on the sidewalk before entering the building. He was fined 50.000 euros by the club and had to publicly apologize to Audi.

Driving Mercedes? You can’t come into the building!

The team „council“ consists of team leaders Manuel Neuer, Thomas Muller, Robert Lewandowski, David Alaba, and Joshua Kimmich and they decide the punishment for breaking the club/team roles. So far, the punishment for the following offenses is:

Spitting in the cabin, in the team wing (all closed team rooms): 10,000 euros.

Allotment of autograph cards not signed: 2000 euros.

Missed marketing appointment: 10,000 euros.

Wrong dress code for PR appearances: 10,000 euros.

Unpunctuality during training: 10,000 euros.

And while the team council makes sure that the rules are obeyed, Bayern coach Hansi Flick is more relaxed, and want’s to ensure that the players are too. If a player is late, but within reasonable limits, the coach does not complain. But it was not always like that.

Flick and Kovac (©AFP)

Hansi’s preceder Niko Kovac meticulously paid attention to the arrival time and ensured that the players had an hour and a half of the unit had to be on Sabener Strasse. Especially because superstar James Rodriguez (now plays for Everton) was repeatedly noticed by being late.

The next on the agenda are mobile phones. Players are not allowed to post photos at the training ground for social media, so mobile phones are forbidden, but Flick was again lenient: phone use is permitted in the fitness room (e.g. when cycling on the ergometer).

Other ’small’ rules: Shoes and training gear belong in the appropriate boxes in the dressing room; Dishes are carried back to the kitchen; No external visitors are allowed in the players' wing - children are an exception. After games, the stars can do whatever they want with their two jerseys (they get a fresh jersey during halftime).

Bayern rules: Only wear Adidas, don't bet and speak German (Part 2)

But what about other rules? Actually, there are plenty of them, like what outfit to were, which headphones to use, what can they say to the media, who is taking penalties, but we will cover that in the second part of the article.