Matthäus criticises Bayern over players' Ibiza trip: 'no real team'

Former Germany captain Lothar Matthäus has criticised Bayern Munich players for going to Ibiza despite a 3-1 Bundesliga defeat in Mainz and the club leadership for allowing the short trip, reported dpa.

The team was given Sunday and Monday off before the Mainz game, and sports director Hasan Salihamidzic defended two-day excursion as "a team-building event."

A week after clinching a record-extending 10th Bundesliga title Bayern had a lacklustre game on Saturday in Mainz who could have easily won by a bigger margin.

Matthäus said in his Sky TV column Monday that former Munich leaders Uli Hoeneß and Karl-Heinz Rummenigge "would have never allowed the group to fly away for two days" after such a game.

He said the new leadership around chairman Oliver Kahn "could have or even should have scrapped this so-called team-building event" and that "the players could have undertaken this nice trip without any problems after the final matchday."

Matthäus added that it would have been risky for new and coach Julian Nagelsmann to scrap the trip even though he would probably have liked to, "without losing a majority of the dressing room."

The former Munich captain suggested the trip was rather "a leisure time event for some pros," given that not all were present, including team captain Manuel Neuer.

"You can see that it is not about the team. They would have all gone if that was the case. And it is a fact after this season that this Bayern team is no real team," he said.

He said that showed in several defeats against lower-ranked teams in the league as well as exits against Borussia Mönchengladbach in the German Cup and Villarreal in the Champions League, with the Bayern squad also lacking depth.

"A team-building event would have been needed after the defeat in Bochum [early in the year] in order to pull themselves together and play a really good season. But now this leaves a very sour aftertaste," Matthäus said.