In addition to the Leverkusen Germany international, five other Bundesliga players are in the running: Jamal Musiala, Ryan Gravenberch (both Bayern Munich) Karim Adeyemi and Jude Bellingham (both Borussia Dortmund) plus Josko Gvardiol (RB Leipzig). The other candidates are Nuno Mendes (Paris Saint-Germain), Bukayo Saka (Arsenal), Eduardo Camavinga (Real Madrid) and Gavi (Barcelona).
The trophy will be presented at the 66th award of the Ballon d‘Or, which is to be held at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris on 17 October. The winner of the Kopa Trophy will be selected by the former Ballon d'Or winners like Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi.
The award for the best U21 player of the year has been presented since 2018 with Kylian Mbappe the first winner. FC Bayern new signing Matthijs De Ligt was the winner in 2019. The trophy was not awarded two years ago due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The trophy was last won by the Spaniard Pedri (Barcelona).
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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Bayer 04 face Hamburger SV for the first time in almost eight years. Although the Hanseatic city team are often below par on the road, they are regularly in top form in front of their own fans. In particular, 18-year-old shooting star Luka Vuskovic is proving to be a real bonus for Merlin Polzin's team, both in attack and defence. However, that should not scare the Werkself: Not only was the last defeat against the newly promoted team 17 games ago, but Kasper Hjulmand's players are in with a chance of securing their fifth win in six games against HSV. Today’s matchday news.
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Hamburger SV and Bayer 04 meet again in the Bundesliga for the first time in almost eight years. This Tuesday evening, 13 January (kick-off: 20:30 CET), the promoted team with impressive home form welcome the Werkself to the Volksparkstadion to round off the Hinrunde. The lowdown on our next opponents.
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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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