Germany general manager Oliver Bierhoff has defended the national team's decision to stage two friendly matches next month after receiving criticism from Bayern Munich general manager Uli Hoeness.

Germany host Chile in Cologne on November 14 before meeting the Ivory Coast four days later in Gelsenkirchen. Hoeness has questioned the point of staging such matches and has also asked Germany coach Joachim Low not to pick his club's young striker Thomas Muller in his squad, but Bierhoff has hit back.

"If we hadn't played these two internationals, then there would be only one single game in March before naming our World Cup squad," he said.

"That would have certainly raised a big debate."

Bierhoff and Hoeness have often had a frosty relationship with the latter keener than many Bundesliga managers to stick up for his club as a priority over the national team.

But Bierhoff says he has learnt to take what Hoeness says with a pinch of salt.

"I can remember the remarks that Jurgen Klinsmann was ruining German football when he was the national team coach, and soon afterwards, he was appointed as coach of FC Bayern," Bierhoff said in Sport Bild magazine.

"The views of Uli Hoeness tend to go from one extreme to the other. At one stage, he was predicting that Bayern would field all of the national team's players and now we are supposed to refrain from picking Thomas Muller."