Europa League finalist SC Freiburg has signed U21 national goalkeeper Mio Backhaus. As the club announced on Saturday, the 22-year-old is moving from Bundesliga rivals Werder Bremen to Breisgau.
Both clubs did not provide any information about the contents of the contract. According to media reports, the transfer fee is 15 million euros, which would be a record for Freiburg.
“Mio has impressively demonstrated in his first Bundesliga season the high level he can play at,” said Freiburg sports director Jochen Saier: “He covers all facets of goalkeeping, has a lot of development potential and will also fit in very well with our team as a person.”
The German-Japanese Backhaus spent his youth at the Japanese club Kawasaki Frontale before moving to Germany to Alemannia Aachen at the age of 14.
In 2018 he went to Werder and will play 32 games for the North Germans in the current season. Backhaus played for all U15 national teams of the German Football Association (DFB) and is the current goalkeeper for the U21 team.