"We said from the start we wanted to finish top of the group. Nothing's changed in that respect," said Heiko Herrlich after the Tuesday morning training session as he clearly set out the target for Thursday. Nevertheless, the Werkself head coach will use the confirmed progress to the Round of 32 to give some of the players with less match time under their belts the opportunity to play against Ludogorets and "show what they can do and stake a claim for a place in the team."
The two Bender brothers missed full training in the first session of the week on Monday and instead completed individual sessions in the gym at the BayArena and Aleksandar Dragovic plus Jakub Bednarczyk trained on their own on a neighbouring pitch. Long-term injury Pohjanpalo (rehab training) and Tin Jedvaj (muscular problems) missed the Tuesday training session. A decision on the availability of the Croat for Thursday will be made after tomorrow's final pre-match training session.
The next and, at the same time, final open training session of the week will be held on Friday at 11.00 CET.
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 working 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 personal 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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Bayer 04 host top French club Marseille at the BayArena on matchday four in the 2026/27 UEFA Europa League group stage. The match kicks off on Thursday 5 November at 21:00 CET. The latest information on ticket sales.
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The BAYER 04 HILFT Day is celebrating an anniversary: for the tenth year running, a large number of employees of the Bundesliga club have been getting involved in a community project in Leverkusen and the surrounding area. Following the refurbishment of the city library last year, this time around some 70 staff members rolled up their sleeves to help out at the Bunker Youth Centre in Leverkusen-Wiesdorf. With the support of the Lebenshilfe workshops in Leverkusen and partner Coca-Cola, a rubber football pitch was laid, a Bayer 04-style lounge was created and other projects were carried out. Werkself players and coaching staff also gave their all.
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Bayer 04 Leverkusen and sponsors club partner NRG24 are continuing their partnership, which has been in place since the summer of 2023. The Bundesliga football club and the energy consultancy firm have extended their successful partnership until 30 June 2027.
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