At 21, Florian Wirtz is the new star of the German selection. Portrait of a player with precocious talent.
At 21, Florian Wirtz participated in his first major international competition with the German selection. Central player for Bayer Leverkusen, who has just had a historic season by achieving the cup-championship double while being undefeated in Germany, putting an end to the domination of Bayern Munich. Called up for the selection for the first time in 2021, he however did not take part in the World Cup in Qatar in 2022 due to a ruptured cruciate ligament which kept him away from the field for many months.
But it is truly this 2023/2024 season that the versatile attacking midfielder, who can also play on the wing, has exploded in the eyes of the world. Player of the month in the Bundesliga three times this season, he was voted best player in the championship and positions himself as a central element of the selection for this Euro at home.
A player with an early maturity, Florian Wirtz was expected to be the future of the German selection for many years. Trained in Cologne from the age of seven to seventeen, he immediately joined Bayer Leverkusen and signed his first professional contract. His signing also broke the tacit agreement between the Rhineland clubs not to recruit young people in each other’s training centers. But Florian Wirtz’s talent was too great for Leverkusen to miss the opportunity, even if it meant shattering the non-aggression pact.
Despite his young age, Florian Wirtz thinks big, very big even. In an interview broadcast by Bayer Leverkusen in 2021, he already explained: “When I was a child, my first jersey was that of Lionel Messi. I dream big, I would like that in 10 years young people want to have as their first jersey the mine. I want to win all the titles.”
If Bayer Leverkusen’s season was a resounding success, it is both the result of the work of Xabi Alonzo on the bench and the talent of Florian Wirtz at the heart of the game, who was able to magnify the system put in place by the Spanish coach. This brilliant talent and this ability to highlight his teammates is what all of Germany expects from its new nugget.