Bayern Munich maintain close ties with Austrian Bundesliga club TSV Hartberg, a rather unusual club.TSV Hartberg have yet to win a major title, but the Bundesliga club from a south-eastern Austrian village of 6,687 people are serial winners in one category: shirt sponsors. Their cluttered kit already caused a stir in Germany in summer 2025, and this season it is “adorned” with no fewer than 19 logos.Most prominent on the front is the “Profertil” lettering with the added line: “#1 Spermbooster”. The product, made by Lenus Pharma, is the world market leader in dietary foods designed to optimise sperm quality in men with an unfulfilled desire to have children. Lenus Pharma founder and managing director Brigitte Annerl has also been president of TSV Hartberg since 2017.Alongside her stands the club’s other key figure, Erich Korherr. In an unusual dual role, the 59-year-old runs his own painting business while also overseeing transfers and squad planning at TSV as chairman and managing director, a position he has held since 2017. In May 2026, MUT Magazin reported on his work, and an attached profile made the priorities plain. It says: “Profession: master painter, head of the company Malerei Korherr in Greinbach near Hartberg with eleven employees. Hobby: club chairman at TSV Hartberg Fußball and managing director of TSV Hartberg Spielbetriebs-GmbH.”Annerl and Korherr took the village club from the third tier to the Bundesliga in a remarkably short time and have established them there since 2018, despite limited financial means, inadequate infrastructure and low fan interest. Hartberg reached European qualification for the first time in 2020, the cup final in 2025, and last season TSV were back in the championship play-off. Criticism over structural shortcomings followed that rise. In the summer, for instance, Hartberg finished bottom of all Bundesliga clubs in the anonymous VdF player survey on working conditions. At the same time, TSV developed over the years into a covert partner of Bayern Munich. Next matchesFCABundesliga10 Oct 202621:30FCBHARBundesliga11 Oct 202620:30LUSBayern Munich: Red&Gold – and other covert partnersAlongside MLS club Los Angeles FC, Bayern run the international Red&Gold Football network to develop and promote young players. Racing Club de Montevideo (Uruguay), Jeju SK FC (South Korea), SD Aucas (Ecuador) and the Gambions Stars Africa academy (Gambia) also belong to the project.Beyond that, there are also “some clubs with whose key people we maintain a very good relationship without them officially being part of the network”, youth chief Jochen Sauer recently explained in an interview with SPOX. “For example TSV Hartberg in Austria or FC Arouca in Portugal. We have sent players to both clubs who have developed very well there.”Sauer, like sporting director Christoph Freund, spent many years at RB Salzburg and built up contacts across Austrian football there. Bayern now use those links to place young talent at Austrian clubs. Same language, same cultural sphere, short distances. It makes obvious sense. Austria Klagenfurt, who have since fallen away, once filled that covert partner role. In future, Wacker Innsbruck are meant to take it on as planned. They are still in the second tier and LAFC hold 99 per cent of the capital shares. For now, though, TSV Hartberg are the club Bayern want most.Good contacts may not be the only thing driving the cooperation. Personal sympathies probably matter too. In the same Erich Korherr profile, it also says: “Favourite club after TSV Hartberg: Bayern Munich. Favourite player: Harry Kane (Bayern Munich).”IMAGOBayern Munich and Hartberg? “A win-win situation for all parties”Since 2023, Bayern talents have repeatedly ended up at Hartberg. Angelo Brückner and Maximilian Henning got match practice there on loan. Goalkeeper Tom Ritzy Hülsmann joined TSV on a permanent deal in 2025, developed well and moved on this summer to Stade Reims in France for €2.5 million. Bayern Munich have long pursued a strategy of continuing to profit from exactly these kinds of deals through sell-on clauses, creating a steady stream of income in the process.In February, Tom Starke, the goalkeeping coordinator at Bayern’s Campus, watched a home game at Hartberg’s Profertil Arena. Speaking to Sky by the pitch, Starke called it a “win-win situation for all parties”. Hartberg get well-trained players for little money. Bayern Munich can test them in a decent league and put them in the shop window. Could more Bayern Munich talents move to Hartberg? “We’re already working on getting the next ones into the pipeline,” Starke said at the time.Through that pipeline came Magnus Dalpiaz this summer. Last season, the 19-year-old left-back was still playing on loan for AC Milan’s reserve side. Now he is getting match practice at Hartberg.IMAGOTSV Hartberg rely on the sons of famous sporting personalitiesDalpiaz is the son of Austria’s record international ice hockey goalkeeper Claus Dalpiaz. That makes him a perfect fit for Hartberg not just because of his Munich past, but because of his DNA too. Quite curiously, TSV have assembled a whole run of sons of famous sporting personalities.One regular in central defence is Konstantin Schopp, son of current TSV head coach Markus Schopp, who once played in the Bundesliga for Hamburger SV. Also in the squad are Nikolaus Feldhofer, son of former Austria international Ferdinand Feldhofer, and Lukas Fridrikas, son of former world handball player Ausra Fridrikas. Then there is Simon Freund. He is 21, a defender and the son of Bayern sporting director Christoph Freund. In a way, the circle closes here.Most recently, Simon Freund played for Austrian third-division club SV Seekirchen before signing for Hartberg in the summer after a trial. “Dad said that he is very proud of me,” he told the Kronen Zeitung at the time. “Of course he also helped me a little and took care of the contract. I don’t have an agent myself.” So far, Freund has played only for Hartberg’s third-division reserve side. Before the international break, he made the professional squad for the first time in the last match but did not feature. Perhaps his debut will come soon.
