“The most painful thing was the feeling that I could have got the job done. I could have led the team to the championship,” Klinsmann said on Tuesday.

In an interview with German Pay TV channel Premiere on Tuesday, the irascible Bayern chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge refused to comment on Klinsmann’s statement. “Parting company with a manager is never a pleasant arrangement. We’re not going to kick him now, or wash the dirty laundry in public,” he said.

Klinsmann was sacked April 27 after Bayern’s qualification into the Champions League, one of the season’s basic targets, was put into jeopardy by a string of poor results.

“We don’t see him as an enemy,” emphasised Rummenigge, “We made a clean, professional break, which we saw as necessary.”

Klinsmann was replaced by interim coach Jupp Heynckes, after which Bayern promptly won three consecutive league games.

Until now, Klinsmann’s reaction to his dismissal was limited to a short statement on Bayern’s official website. He was “very disappointed,” he said.

“We laid the foundations for the future. I still believe the team can become champions this year.”

Apart from the tantalising remark ahead of Wednesday’s TV interview on the show Stern TV, Klinsmann said very little about his former employers. Nor did he reveal much about his future or his professional ambition.

But the 44-year-old, who had been living in California until his appointment at Bayern, did say that he and his family would like to stay in Munich.