It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Bayer Leverkusen can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Squad17 Jul 2028
Leroy Sané falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Nobody at Bayer Leverkusen will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Patrik Schick signs something — a contract at Bayer Leverkusen or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes Julio Enciso a promise
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. El Chadaille Bitshiabu is living that version at Bayer Leverkusen, and it tends to show in the first month.
Bayer Leverkusen offered $390.0K; Mainz 05 said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Leroy Sané was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Patrik Schick is on it.
Bayer Leverkusen asked and Bayern Munich said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Bayer Leverkusen people have started saying his name in the past tense.
The fee is $5.1M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Union Berlin drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Jon Guridi is living that version at Bayer Leverkusen, and it tends to show in the first month.
$2.1M was the most the club would pay and VfB Stuttgart 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.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Bayer Leverkusen, and it is not being withdrawn.
The deal with RB Leipzig is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around RB Leipzig people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what RB Leipzig can pretend not to have heard.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Jobe Bellingham has just signed for RB Leipzig, and for once the answer mattered.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Words at RB Leipzig training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rodrygo is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Bayer Leverkusen pay $300.0K, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Helmut Schubert is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.