At the end of the first week of training, the Werkself – as in the previous pre-season – are away to Regional League side Wuppertaler SV. The match at the Stadion am Zoo on Saturday 6 July kicks off at 17.00 CET. Tickets are available from the Wuppertaler SV ticket shop.
On Saturday 13 July and on Sunday 28 July there are two double matchdays at the Kurtekotten Academy. On 13 July, it starts with the match against Fortuna Sittard followed by the game against KAS Eupen. Tickets for these two friendlies go on sale on Tuesday 2 July. The 1,200 tickets at a cost of three euros each will be sold exclusively by the Bayer 04 Shop in Wiesdorf and the Fan House on Breidenbachstraße 46. The proceeds from the ticket sales will be donated to the Leverkusen Fan Project.
The ticket price and sales procedure for the second double matchday at Kurtekotten on 28 July will be the same. The start of ticket sales will be announced at a later date. The opponents for the friendlies at Kurtekotten are Heracles Almelo (Kick-off: 15.00 CET) and Vitesse Arnhem (Kick-off: 17.00 CET) on the Sunday.
Six friendlies have already been arranged for the pre-season including the game against FC Valencia as part of the season launch on Sunday 4 August (Kick-off: 14.00 CET). Tickets will be available through the usual channels from 9 July. Only the opponents and dates for the matches during the training camp in Zell am See/Kaprun (15 – 21 July) will be announced at a later date.
Fortuna Sittard: Last season, the newcomers to the Eredivisie just avoided relegation with the 15th-place finish. Sittard were back in the Dutch top-flight in 2018 for the first time in 16 years. The top scorer last season was the American Andrija Novakovich with nine goals. The club played in the European Cup Winners Cup in 1984/85 losing out to Everton in the quarter-finals (0-3 and 0-2). That was followed in 1998 by an appearance in the Intertoto Cup where Sittard lost to Austria Salzburg in the semi-finals (2-1 and 1-3). Bayer 04 beat the visitors from Sittard last summer in a 2-0 victory in a friendly.
KAS Eupen: Eupen finished twelfth in Belgium's Jupiler League last season. One player in the team last season is already well-known in Leverkusen: Julian Schauerte, brought through the youth ranks at Bayer 04, played for KAS last season but has now joined third division Preußen Münster in the summer. The 31-year-old played for Fortuna Düsseldorf and SV Sandhausen before that. Eupen have a large number of African players in their squad after the Aspire Zone Foundation from Qatar started investing in the club in 2012. Bayer 04 lost 2-1 to Eupen in a friendly at the Haberland Stadium in 2013.
Heracles Almelo: Almelo finished seventh in the Eredivisie last season. The top striker for the team was the Spanish forward Adrian Dalmau with 19 goals. The team is managed by Frank Wormuth who previously worked for the DFB as coach of the Germany U20s and director of coach training. Bayer 04 coach Peter Bosz was twice manager at Heracles, from 2004 to 2006 and then from 2010 to 2013. Almelo reached the third qualifying round of the UEFA Europa League in 2016 but went out after two draws against FC Arouca (1-1 and 0-0).
Vitesse Arnhem: Peter Bosz also coached Vitesse from 2013 to January 2016 before moving on to Maccabi Tel Aviv in Israel. Arnhem finished fifth in the Eredivisie last season and lost out on qualification for the Europa League with a 2-0 defeat against Utrecht in the play-offs. The top scorer last season was Brian Linsson with 12 goals and the Norwegian Martin Ödegaard, on loan from Real Madrid, scored eight. In 2017 Vitesse beat AZ Alkmaar 2-0 in the Dutch cup competition. The coach of the current Arnhem team is Leonid Sluzki who coached Russia at the 2016 European Championships. In 2013, Bayer 04 beat Vitesse 4-0 in a pre-season friendly.
The second friendly and the first goal for the Bayer 04 Women: The Werkself just missed out on their first win in the preseason away to top-flight Dutch side PEC Zwolle. The team led by coach Roberto Pätzold drew 1-1 on Friday afternoon in Wezep. As with the friendly against TSG Hoffenheim (0-2) a number of first-team players were absent. The coach once again shared out time on the pitch for the 20-player squad. The goal of the match was scored by summer signing Vanessa Fudalla (67').
Show moreContinuity under the Cross: After the successful season in 2024/25 with reaching the final of the VBL Club Championship, the two Leverkusen e-sports players Marc and Sean Landwehr have extended their contracts at Bayer 04 by an additional two years. Marc is thereby in his sixth year and Sean in his third year with the Werkself. Together with e-talent Marcus Hüttemann, who has also extended his stay at Bayer 04 Bayer year, completes the current squad for the 2025/26 season.
Show moreBayer 04 Leverkusen have signed centre forward Christian Kofane. The 18-year-old Cameroonian joins Leverkusen from Spanish second tier club Albacete on a contract to 30 June 2029.
Show moreFirst away to the champions, then at home to a newly promoted club: The Werkself fixtures for the 2025/26 season in the Google Pixel Women's Bundesliga have been confirmed. A week after the season opener away to Bayern Munich in front of 25,000 fans at the Allianz Arena, the team led by coach Roberto Pätzold entertain newly promoted Union Berlin. That was announced by the German Football Association (DFB) on Friday. The opening match in Munich is on Saturday, 6 September (kick-off: 17:45 CEST) and the first home game on matchday 2 will be played between 12 and 15 September. The new season, with 14 top-flight teams instead of 12, ends for the Black and Reds with a home game against Werder Bremen on 17 May 2026.
Show more