How can Bayern Munich manage minutes of Kim Min-jae to avoid burnout?

Bayern Munich central defender Kim-Min Jae has already featured heavily this season, playing 351 out of 360 minutes in the Bundesliga, 69 in the Champions League, and 180 minutes for South Korea, totaling 600 minutes of action so far, combined with the traveling and jet lag with his country.

Recently, reports have emerged that the 27-year old and Dayot Upamecano are Vincent Kompany's "undisputed" first-choice central defensive partnership. In isolation, that is fine. Other than the odd shaky moment, the two have played well this season and they seem to be building chemistry game by game.

Gruelling fixture list awaits Kim-Min Jae and Bayern Munich

However, there must be cause for concern with Kim's minutes. When the defender arrived from the Asia Cup last season, he was not the same. He looked absolutely shattered, and began to make errors that he was simply not making before the winter break, at least not in the most part.

Over the next international break, per google maps, Kim could travel 20,568 miles, all whilst playing 180 minutes of football in the meantime. That too, and the jet lag. Jordan is an hour ahead of Germany, which is fine, but Seoul is a whopping seven hours ahead. He is going to be exhausted by the time he is back.

At the moment, the only available cover for Kim is Eric Dier. The ideal would be to wrap games up early and bring on the Englishman in his place, but in the next five games, Bayern face Bayer Leverkusen, Aston Villa, Eintracht Frankfurt, VfB Stuttgart and Barcelona. They will have done very well to be in a position where the match state allows for Kim to be rested.

Some better news, however, is a recent report that Hiroko Ito is hoping to resume training before the end of the month. The international break becomes timely in that regard - if Ito can be available after the international break, that would be huge.

The game away to Barcelona might be the game to give Kim some rest. With the extended Champions League group phase, the results have less trepidation than usual. The results in the Bundesliga are currently more important. That too, and Barcelona lost their first game, which helps.

In an ideal situation, Bayern can have comfortable enough leads in the next three games before the break, to take Kim off. In a more realistic situation, South Korea can hopefully have comfortable enough leads, and give him rest, and by the time the break is over - Bayern can have Ito available at their disposal.