President Herbert Hainer from the German record champions Bayern Munich admitted mistakes after the chaos at the annual general meeting, but he does not want to change his general course. “After an evening like this, we shouldn’t allow ourselves to be dissuaded from our path. I am a Bayern fan with heart and soul, and I am passionate about this task,” said the 67-year-old in an interview with Sports picture.
But Hainer also admitted a mistake. “With what we know now,” he would “no longer end the annual general meeting prematurely,” he said: “I didn’t want to cut the members off, but at the time I felt that no objective dialogue would have been possible.”
It had become clear to him that a general meeting of a football club was “much more emotional than a general meeting of a stock corporation”. The shouts of “Hainer out” and the heated atmosphere “naturally hurt him personally,” said the former Adidas boss: “It was not a pleasant thing.”
As a consequence, he wanted to “get even more intensively in the future” for the opinion of the members on controversial issues such as Qatar sponsorship.
Hainer did not want to predict whether the contract with Qatar Airways, which expires in 2023, will be extended or not. “This topic is complex and, overall, needs to be looked at in a more nuanced way,” he said. But it is “not an easy task to live up to the expectations of our fans all over the world that their FC Bayern always play at the top internationally – and at the same time our social responsibility.”
FC Bayern: Hainer supports Kahn
In addition, Hainer’s CEO, Oliver Kahn, backed him up, who had been criticized for his passive role at the annual general meeting on the subject of Qatar, among other things. Kahn had “initiated a lot of things, and now the next step is to implement them. Oliver has great ambitions, he wants to achieve the highest goals as a player”.
He expresses himself “perhaps differently than 20 years ago. But he still stands for courage and dedication.” Kahn thinks “very carefully about where he says something and when. This right should be granted to him”. Hainer comes to the conclusion: “We wanted to have someone who stands for FC Bayern and has big goals. He does it very well.”
In addition to Kahn, Robert Lewandowski should also play a major role in the future of FCB. “I would be very happy if Robert would end his career with us. One thing is clear: all of us here at FC Bayern appreciate Robert beyond measure!” Said Hainer. It is an “incredibly good feeling to have Robert Lewandowski in your own ranks – as we have just seen again in the game against Dortmund – and to know that you don’t have to act in this position”.
