Bayern München II

Thomas Müller came through here before anyone outside Bavaria knew the name, and so did Manuel Neuer, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Joshua Kimmich and David Alaba — a reserve side that has spent decades less as a competition than as a proving ground.

That double duty shapes everything about it. The club plays under its parent's crest and its parent's colours, red and white, which is why its results have swung between the top of the Regionalliga Bayern and relegation trouble depending on how many first-teamers needed match fitness in a given season. Munich has known the side since 1900, though for most of that history it went by a different name — Bayern Amateure — until it was rebranded in 2005.

Its ground carries more weight than the team itself. The Grünwalder Stadion once held Bayern's first team before the club outgrew it, especially when the fixture is against TSV 1860 Munich's second side — the Münchner Stadtderby, still called the "kleines Derby" by people old enough to remember when it mattered less.

The one campaign worth dwelling on is 2019–20, when Bayern's reserves won the 3. Liga outright and then watched someone else get promoted in their place, blocked by the rule that a reserve team cannot rise above its parent club's division. It summed up what the team is built for: development, not silverware, though the Landespokal Bayern and a pair of Regionalliga titles sit in the cabinet regardless.

They compete in the 3. Liga now, still producing the next names for the shirt one level up.