MUNICH: Bayern Munich’s star striker Robert Lewandowski wants to leave the Bundesliga club this summer to seek “a new challenge”, his agent told Sport Bild on Wednesday.

“Robert feels that he needs a change and a new challenge in his career,” Pini Zahavi told the weekly. “The managers of Bayern know about it.”

Lewandowski, 29, whose Bayern contract runs until 2021, has been linked with Real Madrid while Qatari-backed Paris St Germain and Premier League giants Chelsea and Manchester United are also understood to be interested.

Speaking at Poland’s World Cup training camp in Arlamow in the southeast of the country, Lewandowski was evasive when asked about Zahavi’s reported comments.

“My manager is taking care of that and I want to focus on what should be done during the World Cup, how I should play,” Lewandowski said, referring to Zahavi. “This is what managers are for, to take care of such things, so that players can have a free mind.”

Lewandowski was the Bundesliga’s top scorer in the just-completed season with 29 goals, the third time he has won the trophy after success in 2015/16, also with Bayern, and 2013/14 while at ex-club Borussia Dortmund.

In late February, the Poland international parted ways with his previous agent of 10 years, Cezary Kucharski, and signed up with Zahavi, one of the most powerful agents in world football.

Zahavi, the Israeli agent who helped facilitate Neymar’s transfer from Barcelona to PSG last year, said that “Robert’s motivations are not money or a specific club, because almost all top clubs would like to sign up the world’s best striker.”

He said he hoped Bayern president Uli Hoeness and CEO Karl-Heinz Rummenigge would understand the player’s position.

“Everyone in the Bayern club leadership has their own great career to look back on. They should understand his situation,” he said.

There was no immediate response from Bayern but club chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge recently ruled out a transfer and made it clear that Lewandowski will play for them next season.

Rummenigge told Kicker magazine earlier this month that Bayern fans “do not have to worry about Robert Lewandowski and the relationship with Bayern... We have a very good one.

“We know what we have in him and I’m very happy that we still have such a long-term contract,” added Rummenigge. “There’s no need to worry, he’ll play here in Munich again next year.”

Kicker also pointed out that Bayern’s senior bosses have repeatedly informed Lewandowski that there is no possibility of leaving before his contract expires.

Published in Dawn, May 31st, 2018