Born in Madrid, Mario Hermoso joined the youth set-up at Real Madrid at the age of ten. He progressed through all the junior teams at the record Champions League winners and in 2015 he played for the reserve team Real Madrid Castilla. That was followed by a 12-month loan to second division Real Valladolid where he made his professional debut. In the following season in 2016/17, Hermoso regularly played for the Real Madrid reserve team before his long stay at Real Madrid drew to a close at the end of the season – for a good sporting reason.
In the summer of 2017, Hermoso moved up to the Primera Division, the forerunner of today's La Liga. He played for Espanyol and made his top-flight debut on 9 September 2017 in the derby against Barcelona. Hermoso quickly established himself in Spain's top division with 54 league appearances in two seasons – and he earned the first of a total of five international caps with Spain in that time.
Hermoso's performances at Espanyol and for Spain attracted the attention of Atletico Madrid who brought him back to the capital in the summer of 2019. The 1.84 metre tall left footer spent five successful years at the Rojiblancos, winning the Spanish league title with them in 2021 and clocking up 29 games in the Champions League.
Hermoso faced the Werkself four times in his time at Atletico. The record from the Champions League group stage encounters in 2019/20 and 22/23: one win, one draw, two defeats. Hermoso was in the starting line-up in all four matches.
Moreover: To date he has not played more games against any other foreign club then he has against his new club, the German double winners from Leverkusen…
Winger Synne Skinnes Hansen is leaving Bayer 04 Leverkusen at the end of the season. The 29-year-old, who will be out of contract, is set to join Valerenga IF back home in Norway.
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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 as he worked 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 personalised 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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Analysing and further developing goalkeeping together is the target of the annual goalkeeping coaches meeting of the German Football Association (DFB). The goalkeeping coaches in the Bundesliga, Bundesliga 2 and the third division, divided into regional groups, meet every year under the guidance of DFB goalkeeping coordinator Marc Ziegler. Following 2023, the meeting of the goalkeeping coaches of professional clubs from the Western region took place yesterday, Tuesday 29 April, at the BayArena for the second time. The Werkself goalkeeping coach David Thiel acted as the host of the meeting and he made an impromptu contribution.
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Bayer 04 Leverkusen have agreed to loan U19 striker Artem Stepanov to FC Nürnberg, currently tenth in Bundesliga 2, for the 2025/26 season. The Ukrainian centre-forward is set to gain match practice at a high level under the guidance of FCN coach and World Cup winner Miroslav Klose. The loan is due to run for twelve months.
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