Manuel Neuer has named his own replacement.
The Bayern Munich captain, entering what he has signalled will be his final season, used a Sky interview to publicly endorse understudy Jonas Urbig as the man to inherit Germany’s No. 1 shirt under new head coach Jürgen Klopp. Asked whether Urbig could be trusted with the job, Neuer did not hedge.
“You can definitely rely on him,” Neuer told Sky.
“He has shown that in all competitions. I have a very good feeling about that.”
German football is in transition. Julian Nagelsmann stepped down as national team head coach after Germany’s round-of-32 exit against Paraguay at the 2026 World Cup, and Klopp was appointed on a four-year deal running through to 2030. He inherits a squad in transition and no settled long-term goalkeeper.
Neuer came out of international retirement to play the World Cup and remains Bayern’s starter for 2026-27. In the same interview he did not rule out continuing beyond that.
“No, so nothing is 100 per cent. Nor is it set in stone, but the probability is high,” he said.
Urbig’s fast rise from Cologne
Urbig, born 8 August 2003 in Euskirchen, is less than two years into life at the champions. He joined from Cologne in January 2025 for a reported €7m, with add-ons that could raise the deal to €15m, and has since won two Bundesliga titles and the DFB-Pokal as Neuer’s deputy. Last season he made 14 Bundesliga appearances, kept five clean sheets and made 32 saves in the league.
Read also: Palhinha to Villa back on the table as Bayern drop insistence on permanent sale
He has yet to establish himself as a Germany regular. Nagelsmann called him into the World Cup squad in North America as understudy to Neuer, and Urbig was caught off-guard earlier this month when Neuer’s retirement timeline surfaced.
“I actually didn’t know he said that. I’m hearing it for the first time,” Urbig told reporters on 5 August.
He praised the goalkeeping group at Bayern but declined to discuss the succession, which he called “a different topic” that “concerns Manu”.
Klopp’s call to make
Klopp’s first competitive matches will double as an audition for Neuer’s replacement. Marc-André ter Stegen, Oliver Baumann and Alexander Nübel are all in the picture alongside Urbig, and none has yet nailed down the shirt. Sven Ulreich has extended his own Bayern deal to 2027 in parallel with Neuer’s, cementing the trio at club level for one more year of handover. But Neuer has now made his personal preference public for the national team.
Read also: Musiala trains again after alarming mid-match collapse
Read also: Swiatek picks her winning streak to tell tennis its calendar is broken
