Regular club Werder Bremen
Justin Njinmah (22) made his Bundesliga debut on loan from Werder Bremen at Borussia Dortmund in September, coming on as a late substitute in the 3-0 draw with RB Leipzig. The attacker helped out in his only appearance for the first team to date because several Dortmund offensive players were injured, but he is placed in the reserve. Since Werder loaned Njinmah to BVB in January this year, he has made 30 appearances for the second-half, scoring seven goals and providing three assists. For a long time he did not believe that the native of Hamburg, who has had an atypical career path, as Transfermarkt presented in September, would one day play professionally. Njinmah even thought about quitting for a while.
“I missed the attitude towards professional football. And for a long time also the conviction that I can do it,” said the striker in the podcast.Athletes Room‘ (quoted via ‘Weser courier“) about his junior days at the Hamburg local club Eimsbütteler TV. While his friends switched to Hamburger SV and FC St. Pauli, he was “not ready at all”. “I just played for fun and joy,” he said. It also happened that he did one run less in training here and there. Nevertheless, Njinmah attracted attention from the professional sector. In 2018, at the age of 17, he went to the youth team of Holstein Kiel, where he occasionally trained in the first team of coach Ole Werner. “I injured myself in preparation. Then I came back, but then it was the Corona break. That was the time in my life when I struggled the most,” he said. Then he “really thought: Okay, maybe I’ll just stop now. Not because I didn’t believe in myself, but simply because I no longer thought it was possible to become a professional.”
In Kiel, Njinmah remained three years without a professional appearance before Werder Bremen signed him for the second team in 2021. His advisor “somehow managed” to get him there. “I would like to make the leap to the top here,” he announced at the time in the course of the change. Things didn’t go smoothly for Njinmah on the Weser at first, and he was told early on that he wasn’t one of the regulars. In the preparation he “didn’t give everything,” he said. What he remembers is that coach Konrad Fünfstück called him and seven other players to the office, and Njinmah knew “there are no regular players here”. That was “definitely the turning point” for him. “At that moment I realized that I might not play this season. The coach is telling us here that it’s just not enough for the starting XI. That’s when I knew: I can’t do things by halves anymore,” said Njinmah, who has been on the upswing since then.
Justin Njinmah: With a loan from Werder Bremen to BVB “everything was fine”
Njinmah worked his way into the starting lineup, played 18 games in the Regionalliga Nord in the first half of the year, scored 14 times and provided six more assists. He was rewarded with a professional contract, which he signed in January of this year, and in the same breath he went on loan to BVB. “He has constantly demonstrated his qualities and, above all, his goal threat in the regional league. And we certainly believe that he is capable of making the step into the professional team. The way to the 3rd league is a good opportunity for him to gain match practice at an even higher level,” said Clemens Fritz, head of the professional department at Werder at the time.
“For someone who hadn’t had anything to do with professional football for a really long time, I felt pure gratitude at the moment,” emphasized Njinmah. He continued: “Of course I would have liked to have played in the second division. I think I could have done it and helped Werder.” But with the loan, “everything went well. In hindsight, I don’t regret it anyway.”
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In Dortmund, where the loan runs until the end of the season, Njinmah has increased its market value to currently 500,000 euros. BVB holds a purchase option for the attacker, which is said to be in the seven-digit range. According to the “kicker”, those responsible for BVB want to decide by March whether they will commit Njinmah or not.
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