
The first training session in the New Year will be on Friday 3 January. Lars Bender and Co. will be hard at work on the training ground at the BayArena from 11.30 CET. The training camp starts the following day.
The team plus staff fly out to Murcia to spend a week in La Manga. In addition to the training sessions, there are two friendlies at La Manga Club on Friday 10 January at 14.00 and 16.00 CET. The opponents will be announced at a later date.
After returning to Leverkusen, the squad will train at the BayArena before the start of the second half of the season. The Werkself play SC Paderborn on Sunday 19 January. The kick-off at the Benteler Arena is at 18.00 CET at the end of matchday 18.

Four Bayer 04 players are in action at the 35th edition of the Africa Cup of Nations being played in Morocco from 21 December to 18 January 2026: Eliesse Ben Seghir for the hosts, Edmond Tapsoba with Burkina Faso, Ibrahim Maza for Algeria and Christian Kofane with Cameroon. Updates on the AFCON matches involving Werkself players...
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After being nominated for the Bundesliga Goal of the Year 2025, Martin Terrier's wonderful strike for the opener against FC Köln is now also up for selection for the ARD Sportschau Goal of the Month award for December 2025. Bayer 04 fans have until 19:00 CET on 10 January to vote for the French forward.
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After a break of almost two weeks, the Bayer 04 Women begin preparing for games in 2026 on Sunday. Bayer04.de provides an overview of the dates at the start of the second half of the season.
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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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