VfL Wolfsburg 2025/26 season preview: Transfers, pre-season, predicted lineup & predictions | OneFootball

2024/25 Season Recap

The 2024/25 season was the third consecutive year that VfL Wolfsburg finished in the bottom-half of the Bundesliga table, but this one stung the most compared to the two prior seasons.

After the firing of Niko Kovač, a coach that has since qualified for the Champions League with Borussia Dortmund, Peter Christiansen turned to Ralph Hasenhüttl in the hope that the club would perform better than a twelfth-place finish in 2023/24.

Hasenhüttl equaled Wolfsburg's 37 points from that season in just 24 matches, as Wolfsburg held a 10-7-7 record following an impressive 2-1 away victory in Bremen on 8 March. Despite a poor home record at 3-5-4, Die Wölfe were relying on their performances on other grounds, as they were 7-2-3 away.

At this point of the season, Wolfsburg were in the hunt for a European place, seventh in the table and just one point back of RB Leipzig. However, things came crashing down very quickly, with a series of injuries hampering the squad and a 0-2-6 record to follow - until the 57-year-old Austrian coach was eventually removed from his post in the first week of May.

Daniel Bauer came in for the final two weeks and while the team's performances in both matches were promising, with a 2-2 draw against Hoffenheim and a 1-0 win in Mönchengladbach, Bauer decided to stay with the U19 academy squad.

Thus, the search for a new coach had to be made; although Wolfsburg were interested in a few Danish coaches, they eventually reached an agreement to acquire 40-year-old Dutchman Paul Simonis from Eredivisie side Go Ahead Eagles, along with a trio of Dutch assistant coaches from Deventer: Tristan Berghuis, Peter van der Veen, and Martin Darneviel. Simonis is now contracted to Wolfsburg until the summer of 2027.

2025/26 Preseason

Simonis went right to work with his new team, experimenting with tactics and seeing which academy talents work well with the main squad.

20-year-old forward Dženan Pejčinović was one of those academy players who made an instant impact in the club's first preseason match on 26 July, scoring twice and adding an assist in a 4-3 victory against 1. FC Magdeburg. 18-year-old Jan Bürger would score from the edge of the box on an excellent individual effort, and 27-year-old Václav Černý, who went on loan to Rangers last season and was linked to Beşiktaş by Turkish media in the offseason, added another.

Wolfsburg's two matches to follow were not quite as fortunate. At the AOK-Stadion, Die Wölfe lost to Espanyol by a single Roberto Fernández penalty in the sixty-second minute, following a David Odogu handball on the left side of the box. Three days later, Wolfsburg would visit Feyenoord at De Kuip in Rotterdam, and could not recover from two Ayase Ueda goals in the first 50 minutes as the Dutch side ran rampant, adding two more soon after. However, the match would be abandoned in the seventy-ninth minute at 4-0, after a medical emergency in the stands.

Wolfsburg still has one more preseason match before the DFB-Pokal campaign starts on Saturday, 16 August. Simonis' side will travel to England to face Brighton & Hove Albion at the American Express Stadium, with kickoff set for 17.00 (BST),18.00 (CET) this Saturday - you can watch the match on the VfL Wolfsburg YouTube channel.

Transfers

VfL Wolfsburg were quite busy on the transfer market this offseason, making six notable acquisitions.

It should be mentioned that improving the back line, which was a concern for Wolfsburg in the second half of the season, was not a priority: four of them were in the midfield and forward positions, and only Denis Vavro would be joining the club, permanently signed for €2 million after a successful loan from FC København. Vavro played 29 matches in the German top-flight, where he scored two goals this season.

The club already had a €14.75 million deal in place to permanently sign Algerian international striker Mohamed Amoura from Union Saint-Gilloise in Belgium, after he finished with 10 goals and 9 assists in 31 Bundesliga appearances, but they also acquired Brazilian defensive midfielder Vinícius Souza from Sheffield United FC for another €15 million. Souza played 38 matches for Sheffield in the EFL Championship last season, and is expected to be in a starting role in Germany.

20-year-old German left midfielder Aaron Zehnter was acquired from SC Paderborn for €5 million, after scoring three goals and assisting on ten others in 32 appearances in the 2. Bundesliga last season. 17-year-old Polish goalkeeper Jakub Zieliński also arrived to the Volkswagen Arena, from the Legia Warszawa academy on a deal worth €900 000.

The only loan into the club for this season is Danish winger Jesper Lindstrøm, who enters from Italian champions SSC Napoli for €1.50 million. After playing 22 matches for Napoli in 2023/24, Lindstrøm was loaned to Everton FC in the Premier League, where he finished with an assist over 25 matches - the assist was on Jack Harrison's opener in a 1-1 draw with Wolverhampton Wanderers on 8 March.

Kofi Amoako (VfL Osnabrück), Manuel Braun (SV Waldhof Mannheim), Václav Černý (Rangers FC), Bartol Franjić (Dinamo Zagreb), Moritz Jenz (1. FSV Mainz 05), Dženan Pejčinović (Fortuna Düsseldorf), Philipp Schulze (SC Verl), and Cédric Zesiger (FC Augsburg) all ended their terms on loan to other clubs.

Of these players, Amoako, Braun, Schulze, and Zesiger would leave on permanent contracts in the offseason; Amoako to Dynamo Dresden, Braun to Hannover 96 II, Schulze to SC Verl, and Zesiger to FC Augsburg. Franjić would go back out on loan, this time to Venezia FC in Serie B in Italy.

In terms of departures from the club, the most notable was Belgian centre-back Sebastiaan Bornauw. The 26-year-old from Wemmel left for Premier League side Leeds United FC, with Wolfsburg receiving a €6 million fee. Bornauw was involved in 15 matches for Wolfsburg in the 2024/25 season, tallying two goals and an assist.

Zesiger, Amoako and Schulze were the other three players that departed Wolfsburg permanently for a transfer fee; the club received a combined €4.5 million. Kevin Behrens (FC Lugano), Bartosz Białek (SV Darmstadt 98), and Lukas Nmecha (Leeds United FC) all left the club on free transfers following the expiration of their contracts, and Mads Roerslev's loan was not renewed, meaning that the Danish right-back is returning to Brentford FC in the Premier League.

Polish winger Jakub Kamiński, who expressed his intention to leave Wolfsburg near the end of the season, and was sent on loan to 1. FC Köln. German goalkeeper Niklas Klinger's contract was not renewed; Klinger remains a free agent and can still be acquired by another team before the transfer window closes at the end of the month.

Predicted XI

Seeing as Paul Simonis used a 4-2-3-1 as coach of Go Ahead Eagles, it can be expected that he will use this formation in Wolfsburg, especially because he used it in the recent friendly matches. This is a slight change from the 4-3-3 that was typically used by Hasenhüttl; the last time Wolfsburg used a 4-2-3-1 was 8 March, a 1-1 draw against FC St. Pauli at the Volkswagen Arena.

That said, here is the expected XI for much of Wolfsburg's 2025/26 campaign.

4-2-3-1: Grabara - Mæhle, Koulierakis, Vavro, Fischer - Souza, Arnold - Wimmer, Majer, Skov Olsen - Amoura.

Unsurprisingly, and as usual, Kamil Grabara starts in goal, with Marius Müller as the likely backup option. The current back line would also remain unchanged; Joakim Mæhle and Kilian Fischer are the full-backs, with Konstantinos Koulierakis and Denis Vavro at the centre-back positions. All four played at least twenty-five matches in the 2024/25 Bundesliga season, making them reliable options to remain as consistent starters.

New signing Vinícius Souza could be paired alongside Maximilian Arnold, who would be able to bring veteran leadership to the squad, but Mattias Svanberg or Yannick Gerhardt are also options to take the other centre defensive midfield position - there will certainly be competition for the other spot.

After an injury-shortened 2024/25 season where he played just nine matches, registering two goals and an assist, 27-year-old Croatian international Lovro Majer will return to the squad in the CAM position, with talented Austrian midfielder Patrick Wimmer to his left and Danish international Andreas Skov Olsen to his right.

Mohamed Amoura takes priority as the only forward, and may be able to increase his goal/assist totals during the season as a result.

Season Predictions

Wolfsburg are very far from winning the Bundesliga or DFB-Pokal, and it would be stunning if Die Wölfe could compete for one of the four spots in the UEFA Champions League. However, a place in the Europa League or Europa Conference League is not an unrealistic ambition; after all, Wolfsburg were in a very close race before March arrived. If a projected range were to be given, it would be between sixth and twelfth in the upcoming season.

There are a few key statistical factors that need to be improved if Wolfsburg want to finish higher. Possession is one, as Wolfsburg were below-average compared to the rest of the league in this regard, at 46.1%. While Wolfsburg are doing quite well compared to the rest of the league in terms of long passes, they will also need to improve on the simpler, short passes, as they were dispossessed 15.4% of the time - fourth-worst in the Bundesliga and not far from relegated VfL Bochum in this regard.

Wolfsburg were also second-last in terms of completed crosses, with 53 in the entire Bundesliga season - only RB Leipzig were worse in this regard, with 52. Defensively, Wolfsburg were fourth-worst in terms of tackles, with 491 completed and need to be more involved in cutting off opportunities in the midfield in particular, where they are third-worst in the Bundesliga, ahead of only Kiel and (surprisingly) Leverkusen.

There is so much that needs to be worked on, especially when it is the third consecutive season with a new coach, new tactics, fresh faces, and so on - it will be interesting to see where Paul Simonis takes this current generation of players. If Die Wölfe want to celebrate their eightieth anniversary in style, they need to start controlling matches immediately - and it all starts on Saturday, 23 August against 1. FC Heidenheim at the Volkswagen Arena, with kickoff set for 15.30 (CET).