Ex-Bayern star reveals: „Van Gaal was a zero as a person“ | OneFootball

At FC Bayern Munich, Louis van Gaal was once regarded as a visionary, as someone who played a key role in driving forward developments at the club. The Dutchman, who took over as head coach in the summer of 2009, introduced the positional game at the record champions and brought about a shift towards possession soccer

In his first season as head coach, he won the league and DFB Cup double with FC Bayern and even sensationally led the team to the Champions League final, where they deservedly lost 2-0 to Inter, but there were still plenty of positives to take away

And yet they parted ways in 2011 after a less than brilliant second season. Although Van Gaal was someone who achieved a lot, he was also always considered difficult as a person. He was controversial, clashed with Uli Hoeneß and Karl-Heinz Rummenigge and stood up for his own principles

Ex-Bayern star shoots against van Gaal

Nevertheless, Hoeneß was always convinced by him professionally. „Louis van Gaal is one of the best coaches in the world from a purely professional point of view. In my view, he is responsible for FC Bayern fundamentally changing its soccer,“ said the Bayern patron a few years ago. But: „We still benefit from van Gaal’s ideas today. But unfortunately, he is also a person who is very difficult to get close to. There was always distance with him, and so we never got as close as I would have liked.“

One ex-Bayern star, Italy’s Luca Toni, has now agreed with Hoeneß. The former top striker spoke about his former coach, with whom he had clear differences, in the format „You’ll never talk alone“ on streaming provider DAZN

photo: IMAGO

„It was well known that Louis van Gaal didn’t like Spaniards or Italians. I think he’s a good coach, but he was always a zero when it came to human relations. There were a lot of problems with van Gaal, but that’s just one of them. We could do a five-hour programme about it,“ said the now 48-year-old

Van Gaal instigated massive changes to the squad when he was FCB coach. Toni was one of the players who was discarded. The Dutchman even refused to stop at Franck Ribéry at times. In the end, Toni left FC Bayern in 2010, first on loan to Roma, then on a permanent basis to Gen