Bayern offer mixed updates on Kompany, Neuer and Musiala

Bayern Munich coach Vincent Kompany will be back in two or three weeks after illness, the club's honorary president Uli Hoeness said on Sunday, while also voicing concerns about Jamal Musiala's health problems and what it means for the German double winners.

Kompany collapsed during training just over two weeks ago and was taken to hospital, where doctors diagnosed meningeal irritation. Assistant coach Aaron Danks has stood in for him for five games, winning four and drawing one.

"After the international break, in two or three weeks, he will be back on the bench," Hoeness told broadcaster Bayerischer Rundfunk.

Leaders Bayern won 2-1 at Mainz in the Bundesliga on Saturday and due to the international break do not play again until hosting Cologne on November 20. Kompany was widely expected to be back then, but Hoeness suggested that date might come a bit too soon.

"I think that was a very bad, neglected flu," Hoeness added. "He is under total stress. He works 12 hours a day, six days a week. That was simply too much."

Head of sport Max Eberl had sounded a different tone shortly after Kompany's diagnosis: "It is an illness. Any one of us can get it. It has nothing to do with the pressure we face in the Bundesliga."

Neuer and Musiala worries

Bayern have been beset by illness and injury this season, with goalkeeper Manuel Neuer being the latest to be hurt when he was substituted for Jonas Urbig in the first half at Mainz. 

He became Bayern's oldest ever Bundesliga player aged 40 years and 225 days old, but a recurring partial tendon tear in his foot now rules him out for the foreseeable future, the club said on Sunday. This is expected to be his last season and Urbig is already primed as his successor.

Playmaker Jamal Musiala is making his way back from a hamstring problem having begun the season by suffering two collapses in friendlies due to absence seizures.

Doctors have said the Germany international can continue his career with little impact from the neurological issue, but Hoeness acknowledged the club have a quandary. 

"We are of course in a dilemma there," he said.

"He has an illness that is not easily curable, but can be controlled to some extent with medication. But whether he will ever again have the performance level he once had...

"But now he is still getting paid. Just imagine if Bayern were now to question his contract and say: what he can now deliver is no longer what was in the contract."

The 23-year-old's bumper deal runs until 2030.