
Kießling, who ended his playing career with Bayer 04 in the summer, will take up the post created for him by Rudi Völler providing support to the sporting management and other departments at the club.
This will be the start of a second career at the Werkself for the 34-year-old who made 444 appearances and scored 162 goals for the Black and Reds between 2006 and 2018. "I'm really looking forward to the new job and working in close cooperation with Rudi Völler," said Kießling. "It's extremely exciting to get to know another side of football now."
For Völler, the culmination of the long-held ambition of the Leverkusen hero to embark on a career in club management is, "a good day for us. Hardly anybody else embodies the absolute identification with Bayer 04 more than Stefan Kießling," declared the 1990 World Cup winner. "He'll really get stuck into the job just like he did as player."


The European jersey has been launched, the UEL opponents have been drawn – and anticipation for the European campaign is running high. To mark the occasion, an autograph session was held on Friday afternoon, 28 August, at the Fanwelt with current Werkself player Montrell Culbreath and official club legend Paulo Sergio.
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After six and a half years, Exequiel Palacios is leaving the Bundesliga and moving from Bayer 04 to the Premier League. The Argentine, who as a Werkself player won the World Cup with his national team four years ago and finished as runners-up at this summer’s tournament, will play for newly promoted English side Ipswich Town with immediate effect. The 27-year-old, whose contract in Leverkusen was due to run until 30 June 2030, joined Bayer 04 in January 2020 as a promising young talent. He steadily developed into one of the best defensive midfielders in the German top flight.
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When Exequiel Palacios moved from the Argentinian club River Plate to Bayer Leverkusen on 1 January 2020, the then 21-year-old could not have imagined just how successful the next six and a half years would be for him. Pala, as he is known, had already won the Copa Libertadores – the most prestigious competition in South American club football – with River Plate. But there were still so many more trophies to come.
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To mark Exequiel Palacios’s departure, we’ve put together a compilation of the midfielder’s finest and most important goals from his six-and-a-half years at the club.
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