Benjamin Schäfer

Right Forward - Heidenheim U18
18 Sep 2026
Friday
Process

Marked for Benjamin Schäfer

3 Edition

The Heidenheim Chronicle

17 Aug 2026
From our football correspondent Steady

Transfer targets

Heidenheim rebuffed over Kaishu Sano

Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Mainz 05 have kept their man, and Heidenheim go back to a list with one name crossed off it.

Transfer targets

Heidenheim bid $1.3M for Elias Lorenz

The offer went to Sturm Graz this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.

Market

Heidenheim sell Budu Zivzivadze for $2.0M

Budu Zivzivadze has left for Mainz 05 in a $2.0M deal. The accountants are pleased; the supporters are less certain.

Transfer targets

Paco Alcácer turns down Heidenheim

The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Bournemouth keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.

Transfer targets

Too dear: Heidenheim walk away from Valentin Gendrey

$380.0K was the most the club would pay and TSG Hoffenheim were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.

Squad

Tempers go at Heidenheim

Michael Heule was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.

Squad

5 new faces, and Heidenheim are still learning each other

A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.

The dugout

The manager makes an example of Paul Hennrich

“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.

Market

No place for Benjamin Schäfer in the plan

“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Benjamin Schäfer has his answer from Heidenheim; what he does with it is the next window’s story.

In brief