Despite the demanding schedule in the current phase of the season, Jonathan Tah did not miss the opportunity to take part in the workshop at the Lise-Meitner-Gymnasium in person. The 28-year-old is very keen to raise awareness of this issue. "I will never forget an encounter with racism from my youth. We had a few dark-skinned players in our team back then and at an away game, the spectators kept making monkey noises when one of them was on the ball or fetched the ball," says Tah about his first experiences. However, such incidents are not a thing of the past, as the Werkself key player went on to explain: "Unfortunately, there are still cases like this today. That makes it all the more important to talk about it. As many people as possible must work to prevent these people and statements from happening. If we all stand together, we can make a big difference."
The students took great interest in the interactive exercises of the workshop - for personal reasons, too. Almost half the group said they'd either been a victim of racism or discrimination or witnessed comments of this nature.
"A teammate of mine was called a 'bloody foreigner' by a spectator at a football match," revealed 15-year-old Juan, who is studying the social components of sport with his classmates in the elective subject 'Exercise, Health and Society (BGG)'. "It was a very unpleasant feeling, but we all stood by him in the situation and helped him as much as we could."
In addition to Juan and a few other students from the ‘BGG’ class, some of the school's ‘sports volunteers’ group also took part in the workshop with Tah. Racism in sport was also already a topic in this voluntary working group. "It was very interesting to hear how a successful and seasoned professional footballer deals with the issue of racism," said 17-year-old Oumaima, who has a multicultural circle of friends herself. "We learnt a lot from the workshop. Such an exchange is very important."
At the end, the pupils naturally also had the opportunity to get autographs and selfies from and with the German international. Many of them had come to school in their Bayer 04 jerseys - and not for the first time. Teacher Tim Ortelbach: "Whether the students, colleagues or our caretaker - we all support the Werkself here! The day after winning the German championship, our headmaster played the Bayer 04 anthem over the school loudspeakers instead of the bell in the morning."
St. Pauli are the visitors to Leverkusen for today’s 3.30pm CET kick-off on Matchday 13 in the Bundesliga, with some 3,000 fans from Hamburg coming to a sold-out BayArena. Here’s all you need to know ahead of the game in our matchday news.
Show moreBayer 04 take on St. Pauli in the Bundesliga for the first time in 13 years in front of a sold-out BayArena crowd on Saturday (kick-off: 3.30pm CET). Ahead of the game, head coach Xabi Alonso spoke about Pauli’s “structure and dynamic”, as well as options in attack in the absence of Patrik Schick and the final run to the end of the year.
Show moreFor the first time in 13 years, Bayer 04 welcome St. Pauli to the BayArena this Saturday (kick-off: 3.30pm CET). The promoted side have shown so far that that are a tough nut to crack, while last week’s first home win of the season proves they have potential in attack. Here’s all you need to know about our next opponents.
Show moreBayer 04 Women produced an excellent performance to beat Wolfsburg 1-0 at home on Friday night and knock the She-Wolves off top spot in the Google Pixel Bundesliga as the season reached its halfway stage. Cornelia Kramer got the only goal early in the second half in front of a crowd of 1,510 at the Ulrich-Haberland-Stadion. The result makes it five straight wins in all competitions for Leverkusen, who go top overnight on 26 points – the best total in the club’s history from the first half of a Bundesliga season – ahead of the DFB Pokal holders with 25.
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