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Bayern Munich manager Vincent Kompany is the kind of football-first personality who should one day take charge of FIFA, according to his former Belgium teammate Toby Alderweireld.

Kompany, a multiple title winner during his playing career in Belgium and England, has also gone on to win back-to-back Bundesliga titles as Bayern manager, a role that carries major political significance within German football.

He played 47 matches alongside Alderweireld, with the two forming part of arguably the strongest and highest-quality defensive unit Belgium have ever produced, one that many would say should have achieved even more at the heart of the country’s so-called golden generation.

Former Southampton and Tottenham Hotspur centre-back Alderweireld was clearly influenced by Kompany during their time together with the national team and remains highly impressed as the 40-year-old continues to establish himself as an elite manager.

“Who would be my choice to become the next president of FIFA? Vincent Kompany,” Alderweireld told Hajper.

“I never thought earlier that he wanted to become a manager. He always spoke about being on a mission to change football, but maybe his mission is to protect football. He would be my president, always.”

Gianni Infantino reached FIFA after rising to become the leading administrator at UEFA, but he is not widely seen as a football man. He has faced criticism for an alleged lack of genuine understanding of the substance of football and for what is viewed as a disregard for the qualities that make the game what it is.

In Alderweireld’s view, that weakness is a major one. In the eyes of his former teammate, Kompany’s main qualification for the post is that he was a top-class player and is now an excellent manager who very clearly understands football inside out.

“It’s very important that the FIFA president is somebody who played the game and knows the game,” added the former Belgium defender.

“We’ve all been fans. Then we became football players. We know both sides. When I was a child, I went to all the away games on the bus. We’re not just people who earned good money from playing in the Premier League and Champions League.

“We’re football fans too. We played the game. We know what it is like. What it means to be a player and a fan.

“The one thing that’s very important is that the person doing the talking should be a football person because look at the World Cup. A 20-minute show at half-time? That’s where you need somebody who knows football to say no.

“The most beautiful thing about the sport is its traditions. New things also have their place, but we need to protect the traditions as well, and that’s why you need football players, football people who have been around the game, to keep the businessmen in check.”

Neither Kompany nor Bayern Munich have commented on Alderweireld’s suggestion. Watch this space?