The players in Black and Red have already surpassed the goals return from last season after 21 matchdays: The Werkself have netted 54 times (last season: 53). Ten of those strikes from the team under head coach Gerardo Seoane came in the past two weeks – with five against FC Augsburg (5-1) and Borussia Dortmund (5-2).
"Confidence always plays a role," explained coach Seoane. And his players certainly have that at the moment: The team have clocked up three wins and one draw in 2022 – putting them top of the form table in the second half of the season. The 43-year-old boss primarily sees the reason for the upturn, after a brief drop in points just before Christmas (one point from three games), as the work in training over recent weeks.
Compared with the months in late autumn, where the Werkself consistently had a busy run of fixtures, Jonathan Tah and Co., have spent considerably more time on the training grounds at the BayArena since the start of the year. Seoane: "We’ve used these weeks to work on certain things – such as transition after winning the ball or learning certain runs. It's all a process and requires a lot of training." Training that is now paying off.
The Werkself are currently clearly top of the table in terms of converting chances: 54 goals from 367 shots provide an impressive rate of 14.7% (In second: BVB with 13.8%; In third: Bayern Munich with 11.6%).
Seoane and his fellow coaches have also fine-tuned the approach to defending. One really important element in the development for the Werkself in the defensive area are previous experiences – which were not always positive. The late 2-1 defeat at Freiburg or the 2-2 draw after leading 2-0 in the derby against FC Köln were "negative experiences at that moment." But Seoane has processed those games with his players in detail and worked out solutions together. The Swiss coach makes it clear: “We first have to go through situations like that to be able to draw conclusions for our game."
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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Newly promoted SV 07 Elversberg will begin the 2026/27 season as Bundesliga club number 59. The Saarland club start their first Bundesliga campaign at home to the Werkself on Saturday, 29 August (kick-off 15:30 CEST) at the URSAPHARM Arena on Kaiserlinde, which is currently being rebuilt. For one Leverkusen player in the ‘Elv’ line-up, the clash will be a special reunion. The lowdown on our next opponents.
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Ernest Poku is leaving Bayer 04 Leverkusen to play in the Turkish Süper Lig. The club has loaned the Dutch winger to Beşiktaş for one year. If certain criteria are met, the Istanbul club – who finished fourth in the Turkish top flight last season – will be obliged to make the move permanent.
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The fixture details for the Bayer 04 Women’s first match in the 2026/27 DFB Pokal has been confirmed: As announced by the German Football Association (DFB) on Thursday morning, the Leverkusen Women will face second-tier side FC Viktoria Berlin in the first round on Sunday 27 September at 14:00 CEST.
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