Rummenigge blasts Premier League clubs for ´kidnapping´

Bayern Munich president Karl-Heinz Rummenigge has likened Premier League clubs’ pursuit of young players to “kidnapping”.

The English top flight has long attracted criticism for its clubs signing talented youngsters from abroad before they are able to sign professional contracts with the teams which developed them.

Many of these prospects ultimately fail to live up to their initial promise as they get lost among the stockpiled talent, while many commentators have also put the national team’s struggles down to clubs not focusing on developing their own homegrown youngsters.

Bayern do not follow such a philosophy, though.

“We don’t want to sign 10 or 11-year-olds like the English,” he told the club’s official magazine. 

“There you can nearly talk about kidnapping and I would have moral doubts about that.

“Our focus areas are clearly in Germany and in Bavaria. So our talents will rather come from Rosenheim than from Rio.”

When Germany won the 2014 World Cup, seven of the 14 players used in the final were contracted to Bayern.