Bayern Munich will soon win their ninth Bundesliga in a row.
It’s not a surprise. Since the 2000-2001 season, Bayern have been German champions
14 times. In the Bundesliga’s entire history, which dates back to 1963, they’ve won on
29 occasions, with no other club managing more than 5.
So, why is German football dominated by just one club and why has Bayern’s grip on the
Bundesliga only got stronger?
Bayern’s monopoly isn’t just reflected in their silverware.
They’ve made nine of the ten most expensive signings ever completed by German clubs, and
their colours have also been worn by nearly every great German player. And, in a startling
sequence, every World Cup Final since 1982 has featured at least one Bayern Munich player.
How? It’s a combination of factors, but – as always – money is extremely important.
And Bayern have a lot more of it than their rivals.
In the 2021 edition of the Deloitte Money List, their annual revenue was calculated
to be €634.1m, which was third behind Barcelona and Real Madrid. By contrast, Borussia Dortmund
placed just 12th on the list, with revenue of €365.7m, Schalke (222.8m) and Eintracht
Frankfurt (174m) were only good enough for the top-20, and one other - Borussia Monchengladbach
(167.9m) - snuck into the top-30 with a revenue equivalent to Premier League minnows Crystal
Palace.
Success breeds success, but a compounding factor in this inequality is the way the Bundesliga’s
broadcasting contract has traditionally been shared. A new agreement will begin in time
for the 2021-22 season. Within the current deal, however, between the domestic and international
rights, only 25% of the latter is distributed on an equal basis. The rest is performance-related.
Clubs earn in accordance with historic performance at home and in Europe, and – to a lesser
extent – rewarded for their production of u23 players.
The consequence is obvious. For season 20-21, FootballFinance.com projects that Bayern will
receive €105.4m in Bundesliga broadcasting payments. While recently promoted Arminia
Bielefeld will receive just €34.3m
A fortunate situation, but Bayern have also earned some of their advantages. Both as reward
for sporting performance and relative political stability, but also for an ambition unusual
among their domestic peers.
Prior to 1998, German clubs were run as non-profit organisations. Following reforms that year,
they were then permitted to run their footballing arms as PLCs, with the only restriction on
private investment being the 50+1 rule, which ensures that overall control of the club remains
in the hands of its members.
Clearly that’s also one of the reasons why Bayern are so secure. Nevertheless, the club’s
football arm only launched as a PLC in 2002 and, since then, growth has been sustainable
and the club has remained debt free. Audi, ADIDAS and Allianz are minority stakeholders,
each with an 8.33% share, with the other 75% of the club remaining in the hands of its
owners.
And that’s a platform from which they’ve dominated the new commercial era.
Between 2002 and 2017, the club’s revenue grew by 355%. By 2020, Forbes estimated them
to be the fourth most-valuable football brand in the world, behind Manchester United, Barcelona
and Real Madrid. And while that progress has plenty to do with footballing success, Bayern’s
real triumph has been in creating the commercial apparatus to amplify the benefits. It’s
not unusual in a global sense, but is within a German sporting society which previously
saw football as a communal activity and had a natural suspicion for its business leanings.
In 2014, Bayern opened their first international office, in New York city. Today, they claim
in excess of 32m fans in North America alone. They’ve also harvested an impressive portfolio
of blue-chip American sponsors, such as Beats Electronics, Procter & Gamble and EA Sports.
In 2016 they opened offices in Shanghai and, today, operate three academies in China. And,
while many clubs are happy to license their identity for use in Asia, Bayern are more
proactive. Rather than simply licensing their identity in the region, they’ve built a
localised infrastructure. Since 2015, they’ve had a Chinese website and also produced original,
Chinese-language content for a national television channel.
They also operate an enormously successful Tmall store on Alibaba, have in excess of
4.2m followers on Weibo and, in December 2020, were announced as the fastest growing sports
club on Douyin, TikTok’s Asian identity.
The cumulative result of this global activity, which also extends into India, has been an
explosion of commercial revenue. Bayern reported €159.3m in 2008-09, and €360.5m in 2019-20.
By contrast Borussia Dortmund reported total revenues of just €377.1m during the same
period. Dortmund’s commercial income for 2019-20 was just €150.2m, some €210m less.
But Bayern’s sporting philosophy has also accentuated those advantages.
In the Bundesliga, they are the only club who aren’t forced to sell players against
their will. Whereas the Premier League and LaLiga have small groups of elite sides who
tend not to trade with each other, Bayern rule the Bundesliga entirely alone – they’re
not only a club that German-born players aspire to play for, they’re the only ‘destination’
club in a league of stepping-stones.
As a result, their domestic transfer policy has not only regularly improved their squad,
it has often significantly weakened the sides beneath them. The transfers of Mario Gotze
and Robert Lewandowski are recent examples of that process, but over the last few decades
Bayern have taken talent from all over Germany. Mario Gomez, Benjamin Pavard and Joshua Kimmich
from Stuttgart. Lucio and Michael Ballack from Bayer Leverkusen. Leon Goretzka and Manuel
Neuer from Schalke.
And, in the summer of 2021, that trend will continue: Dayot Upamecano will move to the
Allianz Arena from RB Leipzig.
But Bayern aren’t just predatory. While their transfer record is hardly perfect, they
have typically replaced players and refreshed their squad at the right times. One of the
keys to the current run of consecutive titles, for instance, has been the ability to avoid
transitional seasons, either with timely purchases or the development of the right player for
a position of need. In addition to which, the club has continuously employed ex-players
in positions of authority, at board level and in the technical departments.
It provides a rich seam of expertise and local knowledge, and it’s another explanation
for why Bayern are so difficult to compete with – and that would still be the case
even if their nearest rivals replicated their political stability or were able to challenge
them consistently. Which they’re not.
Since 2000, only four other clubs have won the Bundesliga. And, of those, Stuttgart have
since been relegated twice, Werder Bremen have sunk into lower mid-table, and Dortmund,
for all their recent success, flirted with bankruptcy in 2005 and, in the present day,
will soon be forced into the sale of their two best players.
As will RB Leipzig, 2020-21’s nearly side, who will likely now sell both their centre-halves,
one of their most influential midfielders and lose their manager – maybe even to Bayern
themselves.
And it’s a sequence which seems typical. While Bayern Munich continue uninterrupted,
the teams capable of challenging them are either embroiled in dysfunction, lacking the
resources to be a real threat , or caught in a permanent cycle of signings, sales and
rebuilds.
All of which is to say that: there’s little reason why nine titles in a row won’t eventually
become 10, 15 or 20.