The second ball pulled out in the DFB Cup draw by the former ski jumper Sven Hannawald had two names on it: Bayer 04 Leverkusen and Eintracht Frankfurt. The second round tie was postponed at the request of the Werkself from the end of December to 12 January (kick-off: 20.45 CET) but the opponents in the Round of 16 are now confirmed. The winners of the Bundesliga clash will play Rot-Weiss Essen in the last 32. The league leaders in the Regional League West are the only fourth-tier club left in the competition having beaten Bundesliga newcomers Arminia Bielefeld (1-0) and relegated Fortuna Düsseldorf (3-2).
The Round of 16 ties will be played on 2 and 3 February. The quarter-finals are at the start of March and the semi-finals at the beginning of May. The final at the Olympic Stadium is on 13 May.
The other Round of 16 ties: VfL Wolfsburg v FC Schalke 04, Jahn Regensburg v FC Köln, VfB Stuttgart v Borussia Mönchengladbach, Werder Bremen v Greuther Fürth, RB Leipzig v VfL Bochum, Borussia Dortmund v SC Paderborn, Holstein Kiel/Bayern Munich v Darmstadt 98.
Rudi Völler was a guest on the football talk show Doppelpass on Sport1 on Sunday morning. On the programme, also involving former players Sandro Wagner and Stefan Effenberg, the sporting managing director discussed the start of the new calendar year for the Werkself. The 60-year-old was talking after 2-1 defeat at Eintracht Frankfurt the day before: “We deserved to lose yesterday. We’re starting a new week in training and we’ll be back on it against Bremen on Saturday.”
The two defeats in succession – the first in the current Bundesliga campaign – would not “throw the Werkself off course,” added Völler. “We want to stay at the top. Our primary target is to get back in the Champions League.”
The Doppelpass broadcast with Rudi Völler will soon be available free of charge on sport1.de.
And here is another Black and Red TV tip: Karim Bellarabi was a guest on the Sky broadcast ‘My story – the life of…’. The 25-minute edition with the Leverkusen winger was available free of charge on Sky Sport News HD on Sunday afternoon. The programme will be shown again on Monday night at 22.30 CET and repeated on Monday evening at 19.00 CET. In addition, the Bellarabi programme is now available on sport.sky.de HERE.
Riccardo Basile, the presenter on the Sky programme, goes behind the scenes with professional sports personalities. The personal stories away from the pitch are centre stage.
In the final international break in the current 2025/26 campaign, Bayer 04 striker Patrik Schick with Czechia will be battling for a place at the World Cup. Meanwhile, national teams that have already qualified, include other Werkself players called up, are involved in friendlies in the build-up to the World Cup. Read on for an overview of the Leverkusen internationals and their match dates.
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The Werkself kicked off the final international break of the current season on Monday morning with the first of three open training sessions this week. While eleven Bayer 04 players will be away on international duty in the coming days, the other players will be working together in Leverkusen. The next challenge in the Bundesliga awaits on Saturday, 4 April (kick-off: 15:30 CEST) with the home game against VfL Wolfsburg.
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Due to maintenance work, the online shop and other digital services from Bayer 04 Leverkusen will be temporarily restricted or unavailable from Monday, 23 March (18:00 CET) to Thursday, 26 March. Bayer 04 will provide immediate updates via the club's official channels if the work is completed earlier than planned. The overview.
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Werkself-TV shows the highlights of the Bayer 04 women's 1-0 win against FC Carl Zeiss Jena on the 21th matchday of the Google Pixel Frauen-Bundesliga 2025/26.
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Thanks to a masterstroke from Katharina Piljic, the Werkself secured their eleventh win of the season in the Google Pixel Women's Bundesliga. On Sunday evening, coach Roberto Pätzold's team beat FC Carl Zeiss Jena 1-0. Midfielder Piljic scored the winning goal with a volley into the corner from the edge of the box (19’) in front of 633 spectators at the Ulrich Haberland Stadium - and ensured that Leverkusen moved up to fifth place in the table for at least one night with 34 points.
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