Sepp Maier, long considered Bayern Munich’s greatest goalkeeper, has gone public with the advice no Bayern great has yet dared put on the record this season.
Asked by Sport1 what he would tell Manuel Neuer if the goalkeeper called to ask whether to play on, Maier did not reach for a diplomatic answer.
“I would tell him: ‘Call it a day, Manu!’” he said.
The intervention lands two days after Neuer limped off before halftime of Bayern’s 2-1 win at Mainz, with trouble again in the right foot that has already kept him out of five games this season. Bayern later confirmed a partial tendon tear and said their captain would be out “for the time being”; German reports put the expected absence at around two months.
For Maier, the recurrence is the point. Neuer has already achieved everything the position offers, he told Sport1, and the body eventually refuses to keep up with the ambition, even his.
Maier balanced the push. A fully fit Neuer is still among the best in the world, he said, but Bayern’s constant rotation between a half-fit captain and his deputy helps neither player, and the club needs to decide.
Urbig and a Germany call-up
The deputy is Jonas Urbig, 23, who has deputized during Neuer’s earlier absences this season and was recently called up to the senior Germany squad by head coach Jürgen Klopp.
Maier’s framing to Sport1 was blunt: Neuer is 40, Urbig is Bayern’s future, and the step has to be taken at some point.
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Saturday’s match in Mainz was Neuer’s 550th Bundesliga appearance. At 40 years and 225 days he also became the oldest player Bayern have ever fielded in the German top flight, a record set on the afternoon his season effectively ended.
Bayern lead the league without him
Vincent Kompany’s side sit top of the Bundesliga after nine rounds with six wins and three draws, 29 goals scored and nine conceded.
Urbig is now expected to cover the run of fixtures to the winter break and Bayern’s Champions League program while Neuer recovers. The German international has already suggested this campaign may be his last, and Maier’s public nudge raises the pressure on him to say so.
Neuer himself shared a short post on social media after the diagnosis, writing that an injury never comes at the right time and that his focus is now entirely on getting back.
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