
After the heatwave of recent weeks, this morning brought much more comfortable temperatures as well as plenty of work for fitness coach Daniel Jouvin: While Heiko Herrlich worked on crosses and headers on a reduced pitch, Charles Aránguiz was back on the training ground for the first time this week.
When the Chilean completed his one-on-one session, his coach 'Giga' moved straight onto the next one: Leon Bailey, who has been sidelined with a shoulder injury for the past few days, was also back on the training ground for the first time. The trip to Valencia comes too early for the pair as well as for goalkeeper Lukas Hradecky, who also completed an individual session today.

The Werkself fly out to Valencia from Cologne-Bonn Airport on Saturday morning. The friendly at the Estadio Mestalla, that kicks off at 21:30 CET, is the final friendly ahead of the season opener at Pforzheim. The match will be broadcast live on Facebook and on terrestrial TV on Sport 1.
Exciting days for our Jamaican winger: After celebrating his 21st birthday on Thursday, this evening takes him to a special event: The football journal '11 FREUNDE' rated the Jamaican as 'Newcomer of the Season' and the award ceremony takes place tonight at the Flora in Cologne. A familiar face will present the award: Stefan Reinartz will make the laudatory speech .
There was more good news for our new head analyst: Marcel Daum was a father of a son for the second time on Thursday morning. The family of four are all well and we wish them all the best and a great time together.


In the previous game against RB Leipzig in December last year, the Werkself turned came from behind to win 3-1 and further improved Leverkusen's already strong record against the Red Bulls. Montrell Culbreath stood out with his first goal on his debut for the Black and Reds. While the 18-year-old would certainly like to score a second goal against Leipzig on Saturday night, the attack-minded visitors come to the BayArena in confident mood after five Bundesliga victories in a row. The Nordkurve12 supporters group knows the Werkself will therefore once again be reliant on the vociferous support of the fans, and has once again called for the ‘Finally Red’ campaign in the run-in. Today’s matchday news.
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Video games manufacturer Electronic Arts (EA), together with the German Football League (DFL), announced the top male and female selections for the 2025/26 Bundesliga season this week. Bayer 04 striker Vanessa Fudalla is in the starting eleven of the women's "Team of the Season". Alejandro Grimaldo and Aleix Garcia have been selected as bench players in the men's team.
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This special event showed once again how strong Bayer 04 are as a team: As part of ‘BarmeniaGothaer gives joy’, the Werkself players Edmond Tapsoba, Ibrahim Maza and Christian Kofane supported the sale of individually designed T-shirts for a good cause at the Fanwelt on Thursday. Several hundred fans came to take part in the charity campaign. Leverkusen's main sponsor BarmeniaGothaer donated the proceeds to the Fondation Edmond Tapsoba, which helps people in Tapsoba's home country of Burkina Faso in their challenging everyday lives.
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With three games to play before the end of the season, the Bayer 04 Women can break one record and equal another at SGS Essen. After three wins on the bounce, coach Roberto Pätzold's team are aiming to maintain the chance of third place in Sunday’s away game (14:00 CEST, Stadion an der Hafenstraße).
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Rüdiger Vollborn has been at the club for 40 years, he holds the record number of Bundesliga appearances for the club (401) and is the only Bayer 04 player to have won both the UEFA Cup (1988) and the DFB Pokal (1993). And the Berliner stayed with the Werkself after ending his impressive playing career as he worked as a goalkeeping coach for the following nine years. Vollborn now works under the Bayer Cross as a fan liaison officer and club archivist. Since February 2021, the personalised Black and Red lexicon takes Werkself fans under the heading of 'Rudi recounts...' on a brief trip through the history of Bayer 04 every month…
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