Bayer Leverkusen's Florian Wirtz is streaks ahead of the opposition on so many levels. - © IMAGO/Mika Volkmann

bundesliga

Bayer Leverkusen's Florian Wirtz: the complete midfielder

08.11.2024

Playmaker Florian Wirtz grabs plenty of headlines as he racks up the goals and assists for Bayer Leverkusen, but the Germany international isn't afraid to do the hard work - and it's reflected in several league-high statistics.

Despite his tender years, Wirtz was a key part of the Leverkusen squad that broke and set records left, right and centre under Xabi Alonso last season. The playmaker racked up an impressive 11 goals and 11 assists in 32 league appearances in 2023/24, helping Die Werkself to go unbeaten domestically in a season that saw them lift the club's first-ever Bundesliga title.

Watch: The best of Florian Wirtz in 2023/24

How do you follow up such an incredible campaign, which also included a DFB Cup win and a place in the Europa League final? Well, if you're Wirtz, you get right back to work and keep making progress. This season, the Leverkusen No.10 already has four goals and one assist to his name, and on top of this, he is excelling in sides to his game that most observers - looking mainly at his tiny shin guards and low-slung socks - wouldn't have thought were there.

Mobility

Wirtz gets through a mountain of work in order to get into positions from which to score the goals and provide the assists that show up in the highlight reels. Leveraging his extraordinary running power, the Germany international makes sure he is in the right place at the right time to bring his decisive skills to bear for Alonso's side. And he does so very astutely: he's not running flat-out for the whole 90 minutes (even though he does come in 15th on the league's distance covered chart), but rather picking his moments and making them count.

Wirtz is more than just a taker and maker of chances. - DFL/Getty Images/Sebastian Widmann

Notable is his success rate in duels with defenders. When a pass is played into space, or when there's a loose ball, no one in the league is better than Wirtz at out-pacing and fending off their challenger. The Leverkusen danger man has done this 117 times in just nine appearances this season, with Union Berlin defender Diogo Leite the only one to come close (115), and Heidenheim's Benedikt Gimber coming in third (103).

Florian runs

Key to Wirtz's duel dominance is of course his ability to pour on the pace when required, and again this is a domain in which the 21-year-old tops the league. Although he is a few miles per hour behind Bochum's veritable roadrunner Gerrit Holtmann, who recently set a new Bundesliga top speed record (22.82 mph/ 36.74 km/h), Wirtz has made 310 sprints - more than even his famously mercurial teammate Jeremie Frimpong (302), and well clear of third-placed Mönchengladbach striker Tim Kleindienst in third (272).

Wirtz on the move in the Matchday 9 clash with Stuttgart. - DFL/Getty Images/Lukas Schulze

But that's not all

Given the free-roaming nature of the playmaking role he is charged with by Alonso, Wirtz needs to cover plenty of ground across the attacking third, and he has done so this season by dominating the division for intensive runs. Indeed, he has racked up 795 of them in his nine appearances, well ahead of second-placed Kleindienst (776) and streets ahead of nearest teammate Alejandro Grimaldo (706), a key indicator of how central the rising star is to Leverkusen's game.

So, next time you see Wirtz wheeling away in celebration after firing home or teeing up a teammate, you can rest assured that he has worked hard - and run a long way - to get there.