
They are the poster boys of Germany's top flight and week by week provide football fans across the whole of Germany with reasons to celebrate and also be frustrated: the Stars of the Bundesliga. The TV broadcaster Sky is running a short documentary series of the same name. A player is profiled in each episode and this week’s programme focuses on Werkself playmaker Florian Wirtz.
The 18-year-old became the youngest Bundesliga player to clock up 50 appearances a few weeks ago, he won the Fritz Walter gold-medal in 2020 and, at the age of 17 years and 24 days, he remains the second youngest Bundesliga goalscorer of all time. The profile of our number 27 will be broadcast this Thursday from 21.00 on Sky Sport Bundesliga 1.
The Thursday morning training session for the Werkself was watched by a familiar face from European football: Kaspar Hjulmand, head coach of the Denmark team since August 2020, attended the session at the Ulrich Haberland Stadium in the company of Keld Bordinggaard. The head of the coaching academy at Bayer 04 was Hjulmand's assistant coach at Mainz 05 from July 2014 to February 2015.

What do you miss most about Ecuador? Who was your football hero during your childhood? How do you most like spending your free time? And what's the correct pronunciation of your name? 04 questions from Werkself fans were recently put to our young defender Piero Hincapie. HERE is the video.
In part six of the 'NACHGEFRAGT' questions on YouTube, Werkself players answer the question of which is the best stadium they have played in to date. The answers from Florian Wirtz and Co. are HERE.

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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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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In Germany, the temperatures are currently around zero, leaving even professional footballers freezing - but not the Bayer 04 Women. Roberto Pätzold's team have fled the cold to the south and are preparing for the second half of the season at a training camp in the Algarve, almost 2,000 kilometres away from home as the crow flies. The Leverkusen squad landed in Faro on Saturday morning and have already completed the first three training sessions over the weekend.
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It was a disappointing Saturday night. The Werkself lost 4-1 to VfB Stuttgart to start the new year on Bundesliga matchday 16 in 2025/26, a result that left both players and fans disappointed. "We played without any passion," said Alejandro Grimaldo honestly afterwards. Teammate Jarell Quansah was even more self-critical, emphasising: "We were miles off it in the first half. You can't put in a performance like that, especially in front of our own fans and I can only apologise to them, to be honest." Read on for the reaction, facts and stats from the clash with VfB Stuttgart in the Werkself review.
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