“Joel’s qualities as a player are there for all to see and as a club, we have benefited from them since the first moment that he joined. I don’t think he has had too many headlines over the years but he has only ever been a very famous figure within our group.
“I have said before that if there was one person who wouldn’t care if he was underrated it would be Joel, but the truth is we could not have rated him more highly. Not only has he set the standards for himself, he has set them for others and this is one of the main reasons why his time here has been so successful.”
Leverkusen have signed 19-year-old centre-back Jeanuël Belocian from Stade Rennais in the current window and have seen on-loan defender Sadik Fofana return to the club as well. They have allowed Josip Stanisic to return to Bayern Munich without submitting an offer to take the 24-year-old on a permanent deal.
