Secondments to DFB teams: From U16 to senior team – which club provides the most players?

From the senior national team to the U16, the German men’s selection teams are in action these days. Which club from the DFL field releases the most players?

They are competitive games on paper but the senior team’s two remaining Nations League fixtures will primarily be in preparation for the World Cup in Qatar, which begins on 20 November.

National coach Hansi Flick has nominated 24 players for the games on September 23 in Leipzig against Hungary and three days later in London against England. Almost half of the squad consists of professionals from FC Bayern and Borussia Dortmund. Munich provide seven players, BVB four.

Different squad sizes

For the last time before the World Cup in Qatar, there will be a so-called international break, which is officially a shutdown period set by the world association FIFA, in which a lot of international matches will be played.

For the men’s division of the German Football Association, there are also a number of games for the youth teams, from the U21 down to the U16, every team is busy. Like Hansi Flick, the coaches of the youth teams have already announced their squads. They are of different sizes, for example Guido Streichsbier has only nominated 19 players for the U19s, while Christian Wück has nominated 26 for the U18s.

Different approaches possible

The sports show evaluated all squads and assigned the individual players to their clubs, provided they play in the German Football League, i.e. in the Bundesliga and 2nd division. Lower-class clubs such as SpVgg Unterhaching, Hallesche FC and Viktoria Köln, which also release U-players (some even several), are therefore not taken into account, nor are foreign clubs. The order is based on the table for the 2021/22 season.

The pure figures only say something about the quality of the training in the individual clubs to a very limited extent. The approaches in the clubs are different. For example, some attach more importance to the team playing better football as a unit, while others put the training of individual players in the foreground.

It is also possible that a club has five outstanding talents in one year, but they are not allowed to play in Germany.

But the evaluation is not a mere number game either. Hertha BSC, for example, has six players in the U18s and VfB Stuttgart five. This indicates exceptionally good vintages. TSG Hoffenheim is represented by at least one player in every youth team. This shows the high quality of the training.

With Matthias Ginter, SC Freiburg has a senior international who was trained at the club. This also applies to the two SC U21 internationals, goalkeeper Noah Atubolu and midfielder Yannik Keitel. In the U20, the Freiburgers are even represented with four players.

Bayer Leverkusen, on the other hand, only has two players, both in the U16s. RB Leipzig has two senior internationals, each of whom was trained in a different DFL club: David Raum at SpVgg Greuther Fürth and Timo Werner at VfB Stuttgart.

VfB is represented with ten positions even without Werner and Joshua Kimmich, who also learned to play football with the Swabians.