Previewing the Bundesliga - Part 16/18: SV Werder Bremen

All information accurate as of August 24^th, 2026.

Club Name: SV Werder Bremen

Founded: 1899

Stadium: Weserstadion – 42,100 capacity

Nickname: Die Grün-Weißen (The Green-Whites), Die Werderaner (The River Islanders)

Titles: Bundesliga x4, DFB-Pokal x6, DFL-Ligapokal x3, UEFA Cup Winners’ Cup x1

Head Coach: Daniel Thioune

Captain: Marco Friedl

Mascot: Toni the Seagull

Goal Song: The Proclaimers - I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)

2025/26 Season: 15^th

Opening Fixture: Freiburg (A)

Yes, it’s me!

Entering his first full season as a Bundesliga coach, Daniel Thioune has taken the progressive route through the divisions and fully deserves his shot at the highest level. Thioune replaced Horst Steffen in February 2026 with the club having won just four of 20 league games and being knocked out in the DFB-Pokal first round.

After mostly representing VfL Osnabrück during his playing career, he moved into coaching with their academy upon retirement. He worked his way up to become the club’s Head Coach in 2017, and in doing so, became the first black professional manager in German football history, owing to being half-Senegalese through his father. He achieved promotion to the 2. Bundesliga and succeeded in maintaining their status in the league. In 2020, he moved to Hamburger SV, although he was sacked near the end of his first season. He then lasted 3.5 years at Fortuna Düsseldorf, reaching the Bundesliga promotion playoff in 2023/24, but a poor start last season resulted in his dismissal in October 2025, and the club would go on to be relegated.

Thioune made a reasonable start to life at Werder. The squad was greatly overhauled last summer and Thioune just had to get the team over the line, and they were fairly safe from relegation with a few games remaining. Setting the team up in a simple 4-2-3-1 which transitions in and out of a 4-3-3, he has been able to get the best out of a few key players, and as long as that continues, Werder should be alright going into this season.

Strap in, because this section is going to be the longest of any club so far. Let’s start with the first of three big departures, although this one is ironically a very small man. Austrian international Romano Schmid is leaving Werder after six years at the club, in which he helped the club return to the top flight and played a key part in keeping them there. Despite fees of €20m being touted back in January amongst interest from Premier League clubs, Werder accepted a fee of just €8.5m from Serie A newcomers Frosinone, since Schmid was entering the last year of his contract and did not want to sign a new deal. The 26-year-old midfielder scored Austria’s first World Cup goal of this century over the summer, with the country having last appeared at France ‘98.

Another significant loss for die Werderaner is the 19-year-old defender Karim Coulibaly, who has gone the way of BlueCo, moving to RC Strasbourg for an initial €20m, but with €5m in add-ons and a 10% sell-on fee agreed. Coulibaly moved to Werder’s academy from arch-rivals Hamburger SV in 2024, and only made his senior debut at the start of 2025/26. Coulibaly established himself quickly as the team’s left-sided centre-back, featuring 27 times and even debuting for the Germany U-21s.

Lastly, starting goalkeeper Mio Backhaus made the move to Freiburg for an undisclosed fee, reportedly €12m, rising to €15m with add-ons. The final permanent outgoing so far is Leonardo Bittencourt, with the long-serving midfielder departing for free to Energie Cottbus in the second tier. Winger Justin Njinmah, who has also featured as a central striker, is heavily linked with a move to Marseille at the moment and could be on his way, but this situation remains unclear.

Significant recruitment has been in order, partly due to those departures but also since the majority of loan signings were not kept permanently. Cameron Puertas, Victor Boniface, Isaac Schmidt, Maximilian Wöber, Yukinari Sugawara and Jovan Milošević all returned to their parent clubs, but Karl Hein was retained from Arsenal at a cost of €3m. German media had reported that Werder sought to retain Puertas and Milošević, but no deals ever materialised. Puertas is still fancied by the Werder hierarchy, although Milošević has since moved to SC Braga in Portugal.

Karl Hein will compete for the number 1 spot with Alexander Schlager, who started in net for Austria at the World Cup, and leaves Red Bull Salzburg on a free transfer. The only outlays besides Hein are a Polish duo, 22-year-old centre-back Oskar Wójcik from KS Cracovia for €3m, and Dariusz Stalmach, a 20-year-old holding midfielder from Magdeburg for €700k. Four other free transfers have been completed - strikers Cedric Itten from Fortuna Düsseldorf and Kenny Quetant from Le Havre, alongside midfielders Chuki from Real Valladolid and Ludovit Reis from Club Brugge.

Two loan signings were completed last week, and ironically both are academy graduates returning to where it all started, albeit at very different stages of their respective careers. Niclas Füllkrug may have 14 goals for Germany and 49 for Werder Bremen across two previous spells, but has hugely struggled with just three goals in the Premier League since leaving Borussia Dortmund for West Ham two summers ago. The 33-year-old spent the second half of last season on loan at AC Milan, where he stuck out like a sore thumb and only bagged one goal in 20 appearances. The other loanee is Eren Dinkçi, now 24, with the right-winger not in Julian Schuster’s plans at SC Freiburg.

Huge concerns remain around Werder’s striker options, and frankly the squad planning in this area has been terrible. Keke Topp is in his third season back at the club that let him leave as a youth team player but has only scored three times in 39 Bundesliga appearances since returning from Schalke two years ago. Salim Musah and Kenny Quetant, both 20, have two senior career goals between them so far and shouldn’t be expected to carry this team’s attack. Cedric Itten has scored reliably in his career, including 16 last season for the Fortuna Düsseldorf side that were relegated to the third tier, but that’s hardly a ringing endorsement of his quality as a Bundesliga player.

What’s worse is that these five strikers (including Füllkrug) are all bulky target men, ranging from 6ft2 to 6ft6, leaving no option for Thioune to bring a different profile from the bench when the attack needs a bit of pace and mobility. Dawid Kownacki is the final remaining option, although zero goals from 42 appearances in his last two Bundesliga seasons means I expect him to either be loaned out or just warm the bench.

So, where are the goals coming from? Jens Stage was rumoured to be moving to Hoffenheim earlier in the summer, but that’s now cooled off. The 29-year-old midfielder, who is box-to-box by trade, has taken on a more significant attacking role, with 10 goals in each of the last two seasons. Having developed an ability as a box-crasher that times his arrival to perfection, and who is also excellent in the air, the Danish international will take on a lot of responsibility vacated by Romano Schmid as both a creator and finisher. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him deployed as a proper number 10, especially with Reis and Stalmach being brought in as more defensive-minded options in midfield.

A huge season also lies ahead for 19-year-old Patrice Čović, who made 15 appearances as a number 8 and number 10 last season, meaning that there is certainly a place for him to continue making an impact.

With Mitchell Weiser finally back after recovering from tearing his ACL, and left-backs Olivier Deman and Felix Agu returning from loan and injury, respectively, the full-back positions will look different this term. It’s complete guesswork regarding who Thioune will start up top, but there are huge questions marks in the left-wing spot too. Samuel Mbangula cost the club €10m from Juventus last summer, the second most expensive signing in Werder’s history, but fell out of favour once Steffen was replaced by Thioune. He showed his ability in short flashes, but was poor in the DFB-Pokal first-round match against 5^th tier Hansa Lüneburg, and that won’t cut it. Marco Grüll is far more consistent in that role and Thioune may well prefer that, even just for his job security.

I won’t lie, my prediction table was settled before the first of this series of articles was published, and plenty has changed at clubs in the last two weeks. Originally, I had them finishing in 12^th which I have to stick with for continuity purposes, but it’s looking like they could easily end up lower than this. I do think there’s a decent spine of this team, with two solid midfielders in Stage and Senne Lynen, a decent goalkeeper and quite a strong centre-back pairing of Amos Pieper (if he can stay fit) and Friedl. At the same time, a relegation scrap is not beyond this club at all, and it could be looking dicey if they fail to pick up points early on.

1 - Bayern München
2 - Borussia Dortmund
3 - Bayer Leverkusen
4 - Eintracht Frankfurt
5 - RB Leipzig
6 -
7 -
8 - Union Berlin
9 - Freiburg
10 - Schalke
11 - Mainz
12 - Werder Bremen
13 - Hamburg
14 - Augsburg
15 - Borussia Mönchengladbach
16 - Elversberg
17 - Köln
18 - Paderborn