Bayern eyes Dutch coach van Gaal

Bayern Munich manager Uli Hoeness on Saturday said that Louis van Gaal, who won this season’s Dutch championship with AZ Alkmaar, is one of Bayern Munich’s targets to replace Jurgen Klinsmann.

Ex-Germany coach Klinsmann was sacked as head coach of Bayern last Monday after just ten months in charge and 57-year-old’s van Gaal’s name – along with fellow Dutchmen Martin Jol and Frank Rijkaard – has already been linked to the vacancy.

“Van Gaal is one of the candidates we are interested in,” Hoeness told daily newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung on Saturday before adding there is a list of possible candidates Bayern’s bosses want to have coach their side.

According to the Munich newspaper, Bayern have already contacted van Gaal who is under contract with AZ Alkmaar until 2011.

Van Gaal, who has a reputation for discipline, has coached European giants Ajax, who he guided to Champions League success in 1995, and Barcelona as well as the national Dutch side.

Bayern have Jupp Heynckes as caretaker coach for the last five league games of the season and are third in the Bundesliga, three points behind leaders Wolfsburg.

But Hoeness says the defending Bundesliga champions are determined to find a German-speaking coach as a matter of priority.

“It is an enormous handicap if the trainer must constantly pass on his ideas through a translator,” said Hoeness.

“There are only a few cases, for example Rafael Benitez at Liverpool, who would make you rethink, but he is not available.”