Carles Martínez Novell takes over Bayer Leverkusen: the new coach gets a contract until 2028 and the task of returning the club to the Champions League
Bayer 04 Leverkusen confirmed on Thursday, June 4, 2026, that Carles Martínez Novell will be the new head coach of the first team. According to the club's official announcement, the 42-year-old Spaniard takes over the team on July 1, 2026, and has signed a contract until June 30, 2028. He comes to Leverkusen after the end of his cooperation with Toulouse, with whom, according to Bayer's announcement, he finished ninth in the last season of France's Ligue 1. His arrival marks the beginning of a new phase for a club that finished the 2025/26 season below its target, outside the places leading to the Champions League. The main sporting task of the new coach will be to stabilize the team, improve the continuity of results and return Bayer among the participants in Europe's strongest club competition.
Martínez succeeds Kasper Hjulmand, who is leaving Leverkusen after one season. Bayer stated in its announcement that the Danish coach is departing after a competitive year in which certain steps forward were achieved, including reaching the semi-finals of the DFB-Pokal and the round of 16 of the UEFA Champions League, but also after a season in which sporting goals were not fully met. According to the club's data on the Bundesliga finish, Leverkusen finished sixth, with a record of 17 wins, eight draws and nine defeats. Such a placing brought participation in the UEFA Europa League in the 2026/27 season, but at the same time confirmed that the club will have to rebuild its path toward the Champions League.
The club seeks continuity after a turbulent season
The change on the bench is taking place at a time when Bayer is trying to maintain the status of a club from the top of German and European football after an exceptionally successful period under Xabi Alonso. According to the official club chronology, Leverkusen won the first German title in the club's history and the DFB-Pokal in 2024, thereby completing the national double, and then also won the German Super Cup. After that came a major squad and coaching change, which the club described in its season review as the beginning of a new era and one of the most dynamic summers in its recent history. In the same review, Bayer stated that Xabi Alonso, Jonathan Tah, Lukas Hradecky, Jeremie Frimpong, Piero Hincapie, Granit Xhaka and Florian Wirtz left the club, which significantly changed the balance of the team. Under such circumstances, the 2025/26 season was marked by a search for stability, although good results were achieved in certain phases.
Hjulmand arrived in Leverkusen in September 2025, after Erik ten Hag's short period on the bench, and the club then gave him a contract until the summer of 2027. In its season review, Bayer emphasized that the team under the Danish coach took 22 of a possible 27 points in the Bundesliga during one period, which showed that the process could have had a positive direction. Still, the final stage of the championship did not bring qualification for the Champions League, and in the context of the club's ambitions that was a decisive result. According to the DFB's official match report, Bayer lost 0:2 to Bayern in the semi-final of the DFB-Pokal at the BayArena on April 22, 2026. In the Champions League, according to Bayer's report on the European season, the journey ended in the round of 16 against Arsenal.
Why the choice fell on Martínez
Bayer presented the appointment of Martínez as a strategic choice, not merely as a short-term solution after failure in the domestic championship. Werner Wenning, chairman of Bayer 04's Gesellschafterausschuss, thanked Hjulmand for his work in the club's announcement and emphasized that the club had gained an ambitious and modern football coach in the Spaniard. Fernando Carro, chairman of the Bayer 04 management board, said that the club wants to remain competitive at the highest level in the long term and strengthen its position among Europe's leading clubs. According to Carro's explanation, Martínez's coaching profile fits that ambition because he is expected to develop a talented team and turn that potential into stable results. Bayer is thereby clearly showing that it sees the new coach as part of a broader sporting project, and not merely as a reaction to one season.
Sporting director Simon Rolfes additionally emphasized the developmental dimension of Martínez's work so far. According to Rolfes's words in the club's announcement, Bayer was looking for the coach who best fits the next phase of the team's development. Rolfes especially singled out Martínez's work with young players at Toulouse, his ability to shape an internationally assembled group into a functional team and the experience he gained in Barcelona's academy. The club sees in him a coach with clear principles and a modern idea of the game, which is especially important for a team that lost several key players in previous seasons and must re-establish a recognizable identity. Such a profile explains why Leverkusen reached for a coach who still does not have extensive experience in the Bundesliga, but has a reputation as an expert in development and the organization of play.
The path from La Masia to Toulouse
Carles Martínez Novell was born on May 18, 1984, in Barcelona, and according to Bayer's official profile he began working as a coach very early, already as a teenager. After his initial years in youth categories, he worked in Espanyol's youth setup, and then from 2015 to 2019 he was part of Barcelona's La Masia academy. In the profile of the new coach, Bayer states that during that period he worked with young players such as Gavi, Xavi Simons and Ansu Fati, which is an important part of his coaching identity. After Barcelona, he gained international experience at Al-Rayyan SC in Qatar and as coach of Kuwait's under-20 national team. Such a path shows a coach who built his career through youth football, working methodology and work in different cultural environments.
He arrived at Toulouse in December 2022 as part of Philippe Montanier's coaching staff, and according to Toulouse's announcement he was an assistant coach in the season in which the club won the Coupe de France in 2023. The following season he took over the first team and remained on the bench for three competitive years. Toulouse officially announced in April 2026 that its cooperation with Martínez would not be extended after the end of the season, stating that he had led the team through a European campaign and that by then he had recorded 118 matches in all competitions. Ligue 1 emphasized in its announcement that Martínez was appointed head coach in June 2023 and that before that he had been a member of the staff that won the French cup. Thus his departure from Toulouse was known before Bayer confirmed the agreement, and Leverkusen was able to hire him without a long negotiation process with the French club.
Toulouse as proof of work with a young and international team
Martínez's mandate at Toulouse was not marked by a fight for the very top of Ligue 1, but for Bayer it was evidently convincing enough in terms of team development and the organization of play. According to Bayer's profile, the Spaniard stabilized the team at the French club through clear principles, detailed work in training and structured communication with players and staff. The club stated that in his first season as head coach he led Toulouse to its best league placing in ten years, and then continued to build on the results. An important part of that period was also participation in the UEFA Europa League, in which Toulouse reached the knockout phase. Bayer especially highlights Toulouse's victory over Liverpool as an example of a match in which Martínez's team managed to carry out a demanding plan against an opponent from the European elite.
Such experience is important for Leverkusen because the club, after a historic double and a major wave of departures, is in a process of reshaping. The team that is scheduled to compete in the Europa League in the 2026/27 season will need sufficient depth and flexibility to fight on several fronts. In the German championship the goal will be a return among the top four clubs, while the Europa League will represent an opportunity for an international result and an additional raising of the competitive standard. Martínez enters that job as a coach whose player development and collective structure have so far been the most frequently emphasized strengths. But the Bundesliga will be a new competitive environment for him, with a different rhythm, greater pressure and less room for slow adaptation.
What the new coach must solve in Leverkusen
The first challenge will be to restore trust in the project after a season that had good phases but did not end with qualification for the Champions League. According to Bayer's official review, even after the disappointment over sixth place the club tried to emphasize that the context of major change must not be ignored. That is an important message, but the new season will not leave much room for excuses because Leverkusen has raised expectations in previous years. Martínez will have to quickly determine the hierarchy in the dressing room, align young and more experienced players and find a system that will bring better results stability. Special attention will be paid to how he will take over a team accustomed to high demands in possession, intensity and transition.
The second challenge relates to the club's European identity. Leverkusen still played in the Champions League in the 2025/26 season and reached the round of 16, but will start the new season in the Europa League. This means that returning to the Champions League is a strategically, sportingly and financially important goal. The Bundesliga meanwhile remains the primary route toward that goal, and sixth place from last season sets a clear bar that the club wants to surpass. According to the official Bundesliga table, Bayer finished behind the leading five clubs and secured European participation with 59 points, but not the elite rank of UEFA competitions. For Martínez, that will mean that already in the first months he must show whether he can combine a developmental approach with results pressure.
Presentation at the BayArena and the beginning of a new phase
Bayer announced that Carles Martínez Novell will be officially presented at a press conference on Friday, June 5, 2026, at 12 noon at the BayArena. That will be the first opportunity for the new coach to explain his ideas, working method and plan for summer preparations in more detail. It has already been confirmed in the club calendar that the team will enter the new season with a preparation period that will serve for tactical adaptation and squad selection. Since Martínez officially takes over the team on July 1, the first decisions about the coaching staff, the role of young players and the profile of possible reinforcements will be especially important. By appointing him, Bayer has sent the message that it wants to combine developmental football and the ambition of returning to the European top, and the first season will show how quickly that plan can produce results.
For Leverkusen, this is a move that carries both risk and clear logic. The risk stems from the fact that Martínez is taking over for the first time a club with such pronounced pressure for results in one of Europe's most demanding leagues. The logic lies in the fact that Bayer, after major departures and an uneven season, is looking for a coach who knows how to build a team, work with young players and shape a clear tactical structure. If he succeeds in quickly establishing authority and transferring his principles to the team, Leverkusen could get a long-term solution for the new phase after the historic period of winning trophies. If results fail to arrive, the pressure of returning to the Champions League will very quickly become the central measure of his mandate.
Sources:
- Bayer 04 Leverkusen – official announcement on the appointment of Carles Martínez Novell as head coach and the duration of the contract (link)
- Bayer 04 Leverkusen – official profile of the new coach, including information on La Masia, Toulouse and the European campaign (link)
- Bayer 04 Leverkusen – 2025/26 season review with the context of squad changes and the Bundesliga finish (link)
- Bundesliga – official Bundesliga table for the 2025/26 season (link)
- DFB Datencenter – official match report of the DFB-Pokal semi-final Bayer Leverkusen – Bayern Munich 0:2 (link)
- Toulouse FC – official announcement on the end of cooperation with Carles Martínez Novell after the season (link)
- Ligue 1 – announcement on the departure of Carles Martínez Novell from Toulouse and his mandate at the club (link)