5 world-class players who dramatically declined after leaving Bayern Munich
Bayern Munich are widely considered to be one of world football’s biggest institutions – and plenty of big-name players have suffered dramatic declines after leaving the club.
The Bundesliga giants have been lucky enough to field some of the greatest players in football history, as well as several generational talents who never recovered after leaving Bavaria.
We’ve identified five players who were considered world-class operators before or during their time at Bayern, but dramatically declined after leaving.
Sadio Mane
After leaving Liverpool in 2022, it was hoped Mane would be a transformative signing for Bayern.
While he wasn’t a like-for-like replacement for Robert Lewandowski, there were expectations that he’d have a similar impact in their forward line.
But Mane’s time in Munich is perhaps best remembered for his training ground scrap with Leroy Sane and the Senegal forward hasn’t exactly rebuilt his reputation in Saudi Arabia.
While he may have peaked at Liverpool, Mane’s decline has undoubtedly accelerated since leaving Bayern.
Mario Gotze
A young and promising German footballer, the minute Gotze showed an ounce of talent at Borussia Dortmund, his move to Bayern Munich became inevitable.
He was literally on top of the world in the summer of 2014 having scored the winning goal for Germany in the World Cup final, but his move to the Bundesliga giants didn’t work out and he made a return to Dortmund after just three years.
Gotze’s return in 2016 was well-received, but a number of injury and fitness issues caused by an illness completely scuppered any romance and he left again in 2020.
You can now find him playing at Eintracht Frankfurt, but Gotze hasn’t been an explosive talent for a long time now.
Arturo Vidal
Part of Chile’s back-to-back Copa America-winning golden generation, Vidal represented Juventus, Barcelona and Inter as well as Bayern during his peak years in Europe.
He won the Scudetto with Antonio Conte’s Inter after leaving Barca in 2020 before returning to South America and signing for Brazilian giants Flamengo two years later – and winning the Copa Libertadores.
Earlier last year, aged 37, he returned to boyhood club Colo-Colo in one of football’s more romantic transfers.
Not bad for a player who never truly recovered the prowess he showed in Bayern’s midfield.
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Bastian Schweinsteiger
Signed with much excitement in 2015, Schweinsteiger flopped at Manchester United and the Bayern legend has since been critical of the way he was treated in England.
“I was very sad because United was the second club of my heart,” Schweinsteiger told the Overlap when discussing his second season at the club.
“On my birthday, when I walked into (United’s training ground) Carrington, (football director) John Murtough was there and said that I wasn’t allowed to walk into the dressing room – the coach had said so.
“I had to ask him to bring me my cleats and training gear. I asked him who I was training with, and he said there was the under-16 team, so I went and trained with the under-16s.”
Despite only making 18 league appearances during his two years at Old Trafford, the World Cup winner was taking home a whopping weekly wage of £240,000.
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Karl-Heinz Rummenigge
One of the standout footballers of the 1980s, Rummenigge was a goalscoring machine and won the Ballon d’Or in 1980 and 1981.
The striker won the Intercontinental Cup, two European Cups, as well as two league titles and two domestic cups for Bayern alongside scoring 217 goals in 422 games.
Sold for a record fee of €5.7million to Inter Milan in 1984, a combination of injuries and mean Serie A defences meant Rummenigge was never quite as prolific again.