Gerd Müller scored an incredible 365 Bundesliga goals in 427 appearances for Bayern.
Gerd Müller scored an incredible 365 Bundesliga goals in 427 appearances for Bayern.

Gerd Müller at 70: Part I

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On 3 November, FC Bayern München legend Gerd Müller turns 70. To mark the occasion, bundesliga.com looks back on 'Der Bomber's' remarkable career in a two-part tribute.

Transfer to Bayern

Müller was born in 1945 in Nördlingen, a small town some 120 kilometres north-west of Munich, just a few months after the end of the Second World War. Like most children his age, he started out playing football in the streets, often using a tin can instead of a ball. A shy, humble character, Müller was initially reluctant to join a football club, and when he finally gave in to the demands of one of his friends, Peter Kraus, and went to training, he was ridiculed by team-mates because of the holes in his shoes.

He responded as he would always do later in his career – with goals. The young Müller is reported to have scored a hat-trick on his debut for TSV Nördlingen, while the club archives also show that years later he once hit the net 26 times in a single game, a 31-2 victory over SV Holzkirchen on 2 March 1963.

By summer 1964 his goalscoring exploits caught the eye of Munich’s big teams, FC Bayern and TSV 1860. As the latter were playing in the newly-formed Bundesliga at the time and Bayern were not, the ever-modest Müller, like Franz Beckenbauer before him, opted for Bayern. After much negotiating, TSV Nördlingen received 4400 Deutsch Marks as a transfer fee.

Inauspicious start

- © imago / Werek

Breakthrough

Marginalised by the coach, Müller was ready to give up and go home. However, his fortunes changed after club president Wilhelm Neudecker insisted that Cajkovski finally put him in the side. He duly did on 18 October 1964 in Freiburg, where Müller scored the first of his 398 league goals for Bayern in an 11-2 victory. Over the course of his career at the club, he netted over 1000 goals in all competitions, although statisticians disagree on the final tally. According to an official book published by Bayern in 2010, it is 1335, but other sources put it at 1289.

Either way, his goal haul is hugely impressive, as is the fact that in the subsequent 15 years, Müller was never a substitute in a competitive game for Bayern. Every new coach had faith in his extraordinary abilities as a nimble two-footed forward with superb reactions and an even better eye for goal. Wearing the number eight shirt, Müller scored 33 goals in 1964/65 – the season Bayern were promoted to the Bundesliga. In the maiden campaign in the top-flight, Müller, Beckenbauer, Sepp Maier and Co. won the DFB Cup and kept Bayern in the title race until the final day of the season.

Milestone

Bundesliga MVP

Goals and trophies continued to flow until Müller underwent a ligament operation in 1977, which marked the beginning of the end of his Bayern career. He nevertheless managed to finish as top scorer one final time in 1977/78 with 24 goals, but increasingly struggled to keep pace with the game.

He made his final Bundesliga appearance on 10 February 1979, having scored 365 times in 427 games. After a stint in the USA, Müller was welcomed back into the Bayern family as a coach. As Beckenbauer put it, "without him, we'd still be getting changed in a wooden cabin." His incredible achievements were also honoured by the DFL in 2003 when he was named "Most Valuable Player in Bundesliga History".

Click here for part 2 of our series.