Kompany collapsed watching Bayern’s reserves, and Eberl says he will be out for weeks, not days
Bayern Munich’s head coach is stable after Friday’s collapse at the training ground, and Aaron Danks takes the team to Freiburg on Sunday.
Oct 24, 2026
Vincent Kompany is stable in a Munich hospital, and he will stay there for several more days while doctors work out why he collapsed. Bayern Munich’s head coach went down on Friday while he was watching the club’s reserve team train. On Saturday, sporting director Max Eberl made it clear that this will not be a short absence.
“We will not be talking about days, we will be talking about weeks,” Eberl told the pre-match press conference. “We all have to understand that, and we all do.”
What Bayern have said
The club’s first statement on Friday said Kompany needed medical attention after collapsing at the second team’s session, that he was undergoing thorough examinations and that his coaching staff would run training and matches until further notice. An emergency doctor took him to hospital. Bayern called off the reserves’ Regionalliga game against DJK Vilzing, which had been due at the Grünwalder Stadion on Saturday afternoon, because the young players had seen all of it up close.
Eberl spoke to Kompany and his wife on Friday evening. He said the first test results were in and more were to come, but he gave no cause, did not link the collapse to the virus Kompany has been fighting, and pointed out that he is not a doctor.
Kompany has not been well for more than a week. He watched most of the 6-1 win over RB Leipzig on 17 October sitting on the bench and skipped the press conference afterwards, when Eberl said he had an infection and a hip problem. He missed the press conference before Wednesday’s Champions League game with Arsenal as well, with his assistant Aaron Danks taking the questions, and then stood on the touchline in the rain for the 2-2 draw anyway.
Eberl’s comments suggest Bayern know he will try to come back too soon. Kompany will return only when he feels fit, he said, and “the biggest task will be to protect him, a little bit from himself as well.”
Danks takes the team to Freiburg
Danks, a 43-year-old Englishman, has done this before. He ran the touchline in Paris for the first leg of last season’s Champions League semi-final, when Kompany was suspended and had to watch from the stands. He said he spoke to Kompany on Friday night only to see how he was, and that the staff would keep football conversations with him to a minimum. “All the football stuff is now in our hands and we work together as a team,” he said.
The first game is at SC Freiburg on Sunday, with kick-off at 5:30pm local time, which is 10pm IST. Danks will be short of more than his manager. Joshua Kimmich misses out again after a bereavement in his family, Kim Min-jae has a minor injury and Jamal Musiala is still out.
Eberl said Bayern never considered asking to move the match. “This is not a normal period,” he said, listing Musiala, Kimmich’s loss and now Kompany.
The fixtures do not get any kinder. After Freiburg, Magdeburg come to Munich in the DFB-Pokal, Borussia Dortmund visit on 31 October, and on 3 November it is Atlético Madrid away in the Champions League. If Eberl means what he says about weeks, Bayern face that run without the 40-year-old who has won the Bundesliga in both his seasons in charge.
Manchester City, where Kompany spent 11 years as a player, and Burnley, the club he left for Munich in May 2024, both sent messages of support on Friday. Bayern’s own message has been the same since the first statement: the coach gets all the time he needs.