Not only the press had special praise for striker Lucas Alario who scored the winner against Paderborn on 25 minutes. His team-mate Aleksandar Dragovic was also rejoicing in the Mixed Zone after the win: "Lucas is an unpredictable animal in the box. He's a lion and we just need to feed him." Alario also scored last weekend in the 2-2 draw with Werder Bremen – his Werkself team-mates certainly seem to be feeding him well in terms of assists at the moment.
In addition to Alario and Dragovic, there was another Bayer 04 pro on the pitch against Paderborn who the fans last saw in a competitive match 334 days ago. Defender Panagiotis Retsos, at Leverkusen since the summer of 2017 and hit by several long-term injuries, celebrated his comeback. The 21-year-old replace the injured Lars Bender on 31 minutes and did a good job. May that continue, Panos!
Turid Knaak wore the Bayer 04 shirt for six years (2011-17). In that time, she made 102 appearances scoring 20 goals. What few people know: The striker was a winner with the Werkself women's team in 2015 in the last DFB indoor cup competition. Since the summer of 2017, the 28-year-old has been at the Flyeralarm Bundesliga club SGS Essen and on Sunday (from 18.00 CET, live on ARD) she is replacing the ARD ski expert Felix Neureuther, absent due to illness, in drawing the Round of 16 matches of the DFB Cup. She will be accompanied in the German Football Museum in Dortmund by Andreas Köpke, the Germany goalkeeping coach, and presenter Matthias Opdenhövel.
Bayer 04 failed to win in five games in October: In the group stage of the Champions League there were two defeats at Juventus (0-3) and Atletico Madrid (0-1), a 3-0 defeat at Eintracht Frankfurt plus two draws (1-1 against Leipzig, 2-2 against Werder Bremen). The DFB Cup did bring the first win for the Werkself in this less than golden October.
The Bayer 04 pros now go into November. And the Werkself fixture list continues to bring game after game: There are six matches in 26 days with a number of exciting duels. The meeting with the league leaders Borussia Mönchengladbach is followed by the visit of Atletico Madrid to the BayArena and in form Wolfsburg and Freiburg are also opponents as are Champions League competitors Lokomotiv Moscow and then Bayern Munich.
Bayer 04 Leverkusen will have to manage without centre-back Edmond Tapsoba in the coming weeks. The Burkina Faso international returned to the Werkself from the Africa Cup of Nations in Morocco with a muscle injury.
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The Werkself are away to Hamburg SV at the end of the Hinrunde in the 2025/26 Bundesliga campaign. The match at the newly promoted club is on Tuesday night, 13 January (kick-off: 20:30 CET). Ahead of the first encounter with HSV since 2018, Kasper Hjulmand spoke about the strengths of the opponents, lessons learnt from the home defeat against VfB Stuttgart and provided a squad update.
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In Germany, the temperatures are currently around zero, leaving even professional footballers freezing - but not the Bayer 04 Women. Roberto Pätzold's team have fled the cold to the south and are preparing for the second half of the season at a training camp in the Algarve, almost 2,000 kilometres away from home as the crow flies. The Leverkusen squad landed in Faro on Saturday morning and have already completed the first three training sessions over the weekend.
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It was a disappointing Saturday night. The Werkself lost 4-1 to VfB Stuttgart to start the new year on Bundesliga matchday 16 in 2025/26, a result that left both players and fans disappointed. "We played without any passion," said Alejandro Grimaldo honestly afterwards. Teammate Jarell Quansah was even more self-critical, emphasising: "We were miles off it in the first half. You can't put in a performance like that, especially in front of our own fans and I can only apologise to them, to be honest." Read on for the reaction, facts and stats from the clash with VfB Stuttgart in the Werkself review.
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