A serious knee injury threw Barca captain and national goalkeeper Marc-André ter Stegen off track in September. In the new year, the 32-year-old is working on his comeback.
After Marc-André ter Stegen tore his right patellar tendon in the 5-1 defeat to Villareal in September, there was suddenly a gap in the goalkeeping position at both club level in Barcelona and in the German national team.
It was particularly unfortunate timing for ter Stegen, as he had recently been named the new number 1 in the DFB goalkeeping position by national team coach Julian Nagelsmann after more than a decade of waiting. But even after the bad news, the DFB publicly backed the 32-year-old.
No exact comeback date yet
Shortly before Christmas, ter Stegen was finally back on the training ground with his teammates at FC Barcelona, even if the keeper did not yet take part in the action. Instead, Ter Stegen was in demand in his role as Barca captain: he presented Alejandro Balde with a club shirt for his 100th game, to the applause of Robert Lewandowski and Co.
Ter Stegen now wants to put the unfortunate year of 2024 behind him, he is looking confidently at the coming twelve months and working as hard as possible on his return between the German and Catalan posts. He is “going full throttle into the next year,” the Mönchengladbach native assured. An exact date for the longed-for comeback is still unclear, but ter Stegen hopes “to make it back onto the pitch as soon as possible”.
Whether the goalkeeper will play another game for his club or the national team this season is questionable, but a full recovery is more important anyway. Because ter Stegen wants to attack again in the 2025/26 World Cup season at the latest. His big goal is the XXL tournament in the USA, Canada and Mexico.
