Bayern Munich called a specially-convened press conference on Friday morning during which club representatives Uli Hoeness, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge and Hasan Salihamidzic came out windmilling wildly.
The crux of the Bayern gripe is that the club are bloody well fed up with the incessant criticism their team is attracting from the media at the moment and want it to stop.
Just look how big, nasty and intimidating they tried to be…
Our press conference with Uli #Hoeneß, Karl-Heinz #Rummenigge and @Brazzo is now live on https://t.co/Qt3FmouxFi 🎙#MiaSanMia pic.twitter.com/GhSPH3W9nF
— FC Bayern English (@FCBayernEN) 19 October 2018
Indeed, Hoeness kicked off by barking that it is time for the “most important club in Germany” to take a clear, possibly litigious stand against the onslaught.
Rummenigge then added that Bayern are no longer willing to put up with the “degrading, slanderous” haranguing of their players and their under-pressure coach, Niko Kovac.
Why, anybody would think the Bavarian goliaths have made a largely underwhelming start to the season and currently lie sixth in the Bundesliga after getting trollied 3-0 at home by Borussia Monchengladbach in their last outing or something.
Hoeness and Rummenigge were positively incandescent with righteous indignation, lashing out at various outlets and even individual journalists for picking on individual Bayern players who them deem to be under-performing.
Rummenigge even invoked Article One of Germany’s Basic Law:
We do not accept the criticism of the players in this style. I would like to recall Basic Law: ‘The dignity of man is inviolable’. We will no longer accept the criticism of FC Bayern.
Then, literally minutes later, and without a single iota of irony, Hoeness went and undermined the whole thing when answering a question about the club’s decision to allow Juan Bernat to join PSG over the summer.
You guys keep asking why we sold Bernat, as if the sale of him is the only reason we are losing.
Just look at the Sevilla game and see that this Bernat almost single-handedly made us get knocked out with his errors.
That day we decided to sell him, because his mistakes almost cost us Champions League success.
What was that you were saying about Bayern being above stooping to personal character assassinations, Uli old boy?
According to ESPN correspondent Stefan Buczko, this tiny inconsistency was flagged up by another journalist in the room, which seemed to bring a momentary, slightly embarrassing halt to proceedings.
I applaud the colleague who just called Rummenigge and Hoeneß out for their own lack of respect toward Mesut Özil and Karim Bellarabi. Their faces did freeze fro a second there. #fcbpk
— Stefan Buczko (@StefanBuczko) 19 October 2018
Hoeness, of course, is the same chap who admonished Mesut Ozil for “being sh*t for years” , among other such nonsense, in a diatribe dating all the way back to July of this year.
Crikey, Bayern lose a few matches, fall a little off the pace and suddenly an atomic bomb goes off in the board room.
We’d like to think that Hoeness and Rummenigge are attempting a distraction tactic to divert the flack from Kovac and his team while they attempt to re-right themselves.
But, honestly, we think that’s giving the two angry dunces far too much credit.