"It feels good to get going again. And, of course, it's even more fun with this weather and on these pitches," said Peter Bosz after the almost exactly 60-minute long foray into the new season. With pleasant summer weather conditions and under the eyes of sporting director Simon Rolfes, Bayer 04 CEO Fernando Carro and numerous fans, the three new signings Kerem Demirbay, Moussa Diaby and Daley Sinkgraven showed what they could do. "You can't say too much about the lads after just one hour on the training ground. But I think you could see they are good players," said the 55-year-old Dutchman who put the Werkself squad through their paces with sprints and stamina work plus passing and shooting drills before rounding it off with a practice match.
The Werkself international players Lukas Hradecky, Julian Baumgartlinger, Aleksandar Dragovic, Kai Havertz, Tin Jedvaj plus Charles Aránguiz, Leon Bailey and Jonathan Tah, who captained the Germany U 21s in the European Championship final on Sunday, were unavailable for the first training session. While the first mentioned are due to return next Monday, Tah, Bailey and Aránguiz will be away a little longer – and are only expected to return to Leverkusen after the training camp in Zell am See-Kaprun (15 to 21 July). "They need rest. We are trying to give all players – including Jonathan Tah, Charles Aránguiz and Leon Bailey – three weeks holiday. If we don't do that then they could get injured or go into the new season tired," explained Bosz before adding: "That gives other players the opportunity to show what they can do."
For example in the first friendly on Saturday (6 July, 17.00 CET) away to Regional League side Wuppertaler SV. The head coach said all players available to him will play for at least 45 minutes. Until then there are two other open training sessions this week (Tuesday and Friday each at 10.30 CET) plus the obligatory medical performance tests on Thursday.
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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