Highest Paid Bundesliga Players in 2021

Recently we took a closer look at Ligue 1 finances to identify the

. Frankly the numbers were extraordinarily high especially considering the not so great situation Ligue 1 clubs are in right now, which prompted us to do the same for Bundesliga as well. Compared to other elite European leagues, Bundesliga players salaries has always been more balanced and there are never crazy, big contracts for any player in the league unless that player, like Robert Lewandowski, totally deserves it.

But the Bundesliga too faces the threat of escalation, meaning that while other European competitors could pay so much more than the Bundesliga clubs, then there is no guarantee of anyone staying within the league if he has offers from outside. We already saw it happen during this summer when Leon Goretzka and Joshua Kimmich, two of Bundesliga and Bayern’s best players, demanding much higher wages (and rightfully so) in order to not leave the club. now with all this being said, let’s take a closer look at some of these wages and determine the

highest paid Bundesliga players in 2021

:

Top 10 Highest-Paid Bundesliga Football Players

It is safe to say that among all the players’ wages from different leagues that we have covered so far, the top 10 highest-paid Bundesliga football players will be the one that will be subject to most changes with several players on this list either being in the last year of their contract or on the verge of contract extension. Now let’s see who these players are:

10. Axel Witsel

One of Belgium’s so called golden generation, Axel Witsel is the first name on our list of highest paid Bundesliga players in 2021. The Borussia Dortmund midfielder has been a solid part of BVB’s squad since he joined them from Tianjin Quanjian back in 2018. Witsel is a competent midfielder but 32 year old has had a strange career path since he made his debut at Standard Liege back in 2006. Witsel as had spells at, Portugal, Russia and China before coming to Germany whilst being a solid part of the Belgian squad.

In fact, Witsel’s move to Tianjin Quanjian caused a bit of controversy back in 2017 as back then Witsel was on insanely high wages that put him in the same bracket as of Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi in terms of wages. Witsel was earning something close to £20million which is enormous especially considering the caliber of players that were on similar amount of wages. Nonetheless, Chinese League ran into some problems financing all these expensive moves and ridiculously high wages so a lot of them came back to Europe after only a season or two.

This included Axel Witsel who came back to Europe in 2018 after only a year in China and this time to Borussia Dortmund. Despite being paid less than half the amount of wages he was being paid in China, Axel Witsel signed a 4-year deal that made him one of the

highest paid players in Bundesliga

back then and still today. The Belgian international earns somewhere around

£8,070,000

yearly which means his weekly salary is

£150k

. which is still a lot more than some of Bundesliga players salaries.

9. Mats Hummels

Coming at No. 9 amongst the

top 10 highest-paid Bundesliga football players

is Borussia Dortmund’s Mats Hummels who is one of only 3 Dortmund players on our list. The former Bayern Munich player and 2014 World Cup winner has spent all of his career at either Bayern Munich or Dortmund and is considered to be one of the

of his generation. a ball playing center back who is capable of both taking the ball in attack as well as closing down attackers, you can be dead sure that Hummels would be paid a decent amount of wages in any team that he chose to play.

Briefly after making his debut for Bayern during the 2006-07 season, Mats Hummels joined

on a loan move that would later be made permanent. There he managed to be a part of one of the best Dortmund teams in recent memory and win 2 Bundesliga titles among other trophies, at which point in 2016 Hummels decided to rejoin Bayern for 3 seasons where he won all domestic titles in each season. then in the summer of 2019 Hummels once again came back to Dortmund in a deal worth €37 million that saw him become the club’s vice captain and second best earner.

The deal that brought him back to the club in 2019 will run until the end of the season and sees the World Cup winner earn somewhere around

£175k

weekly which rounds out to about

£9,100,000

in yearly wages. This makes him one of the highest paid Bundesliga players in 2021. Certainly not bad for a 32 year old defender but with his contract up in a few months, we’ll have to see if he’ll renew his contract with Dortmund or decides to find his fortunes elsewhere.

8. Leon Goretzka

Leon Goretzka is the first Bayern Munich player on our list of highest earner in Bundesliga but he is certainly not the last. The former Schalke 04 midfielder, who is definitely one of the best German players around, was subject to much transfer speculation this summer which was mainly due to him running down his contract at Bayern and refusing to renew his contract. But the situation seems to be moving forward now with reports claiming him accepting Bayern Munich’s new deal.

Goretzka joined Bayern Munich in 2018 on a free transfer after 5 seasons with

. Bayern made sure he was compensated well as there were a lot of English clubs after him too but the deal that brought him to Bayern Munich was worth

£9,100,000

in yearly wages, the same as Mats Hummels. Goretzka then went on to win 3 consecutive Bundesliga titles, 2 DFB-Pokals but more importantly the Champions League in the 2019-20 season. he and the club went on to win an astonishing sextuple of trophies that season, something that has been done only once in European football prior to this.

As Goretzka was a big part of that successful team and one of the most sought after midfielders in Europe there was bound to be much speculations about his future at Munich. With him already being one of the highest paid Bundesliga players in 2021, there were doubts that Bayern Munich could afford another contract raise and many thought that Goretzka’s future was perhaps in the Premier League and Manchester United.

However, Goal reported last week that Goretzka finally agreed to a contract renewal with Bayern Munich which will run till the summer of 2026 and see him earn somewhere between 12 and 15 million euros a year which is a cut above the rest of the

Bundesliga players salaries

. Since the deal isn’t announced as of yet, we’ll just have to go with his old salary and put Goretzka at No.8.

7. Marco Reus 

Borussia Dortmund’s captain and one of the best players of the last decade, Marco Reus comes at 7th amongst the

highest paid Bundesliga players in 2021

. Reus is the third and last Dortmund player on our list. Dortmund’s skipper is currently on his 10th season with Die Schwarzengelben and seems to have put his injury problems mostly behind him, instead focusing on nurturing Dortmund’s incredible young talents in recent seasons.

A

who can finish chances almost as gracefully as he makes them, Marco Reus was once one of the most coveted players in Europe but his dedication to

has been always unwavering which has led to him turning many big offers from the Europe’s elites. In turn BVB has saved no expense on their part while giving him contracts which has made him one of the best paid players in the country, making his wages a cut above Bundesliga players salaries.

According to reports, Marco Reus’ current contract, which was penned in March of 2018, sees the incredible playmaker make

£10,920,000

which would be

£210k

in weekly wages plus performance-related bonuses.  Reus’ current contract much like Mats Hummels runs out at the end of this season and it’s an issue that BVB have to address at some point. If he decides to renew with Dortmund, whether he’ll get a raise or not is doubtful though!

6. Lucas Hernandez

Lucas Hernandez is surely a great player and a quality full back but the jury is still out when it comes to his impact and time at Bayern Munich. The former Atletico Madrid player, joined Die Rotten as a World Cup winner in what was the most expensive transfer signing in Bundesliga history but the numerous injuries he has suffered as well as the emergence of the incredible talent that is Alphonso Davies as their new left back, has put a question mark on Lucas Hernandez’ stay at Bayern, especially his high salary.

Arriving in the summer of 2019, Lucas Hernandez signed for Bayern Munich for a reported transfer fee of around €80 million which was, and still is, both Bayern Munich and Bundesliga’s record signing. The 2018 World Cup winner was touted to become one of the best full backs of his generation, something which he can still totally do, but injuries have set him back a bit. As usual with these kind of high profile transfers there was also huge wages involved, wages that made Lucas Hernandez one of the highest paid players in Bundesliga.

The 25 year old

defender has a contract with Bayern Munich that runs till the summer of 2024 and sees him being paid over

£250k

in weekly wages which is around

13 million Euros

a year. That puts Hernandez in the same bracket as Thomas Muller and Manuel Neuer, which considering his performances may raise a few eyebrows but the Frenchman is certainly determined to silence the haters and prove why he is one of the highest paid Bundesliga players in 2021.

5. Thomas Muller

The lovable Thomas Muller comes at the 5th spot amongst the top 10 highest-paid Bundesliga football players. The Germany international has won it all with Bayern and has been one of the main pillars of Bayern Munich’s success and resurgence in the last decade. A product of Bayern Munich’s youth academy, which is rarely seen these days, Muller has become one of the

as well as one of the best German players ever.

Muller who is going into his 14th season at the club, first emerged as a starter back when Luis van Gaal was managing Bayern in 2008. He has since become a potent attacking force, providing goals and scoring them as well. He is what is now known as a Raumdeuter, a player who hunts for spaces in the opposition’s half and exploits them. Muller is now 4th in terms of all-time appearances for Bayern Munich with 585 appearances for Die Rotten and is also their joint 4th top goal scorer of all time with 215 goals.

So it’s only natural he is paid a decent amount in wages. Muller’s current contract runs till the end of next season and sees him get paid

£13,676,000

yearly which means his weekly salary is around

£263k

. with him being 31, it’s doubtful that he will get a raise for his next contract extension but he isn’t likely to leave Bayern even if it means he has to get pay cut!

4. Joshua Kimmich 

Another Bayern Munich player that was subject to much transfer speculation and contract renewal talks, was the incredible Joshua Kimmich. But as of 23rd of August his contract situation has been sorted out and he’s jumped up big time in the top 10 highest-paid Bundesliga football players from being 7th to now being 4th. But there are few who could argue against such a big pay rise for Joshua Kimmich because he has been at the heart of everything that has been going right for Bayern in recent seasons.

Joining Bayern in 2015 from their now-rivals,

, Joshua Kimmich was brought in to first learn from and then replace the legendary

. For anyone who’s been following Bayern Munich in recent years, it’s obvious that Kimmich is very much on the same path as Lahm since he first mastered being a full back and now has moved on to the midfield. The only big thing that differentiates him from Lahm is the fact that Kimmich is a much more creative player.

And Joshua Kimmich has shown that, especially since Thiago Alcantara left Bayern Munich, Kimmich has been the engine that runs Bayern’s game and orchestrates their attack. So it was only a matter of time that either he was handed a big new contract or there was talk of him leaving Bayern. Although him transferring away from Bayern was not really a serious matter, Bayern Munich acted quickly and renewed his last contract, which earned him £9,100,000 a year, till the summer of 2026, making him one of the highest paid players in Bundesliga.

Kimmich’s new contract sees him earn somewhere around 15 million euros a year in yearly wages, which would be a salary of

£290k

a week. A fair salary for a player of Kimmich’s caliber and potential.

3. Leroy Sane

The transfer of Leroy Sane and his incredibly high wages was exactly the thing we were talking about at the start of this article when we mentioned the problem of escalation. The former Schalke 04 player who had incredible success with

under Pep Guardiola, agreed to join Bayern after their incredible Treble-winning season but in order for Bayern to be attractive for a Premier League player, the club had to pay insane amount of wages to Sane when compared to the standard of the league.

This led to several of Bayern Munich players who played a big part in that aforementioned Treble success and were nearing the end of their contract, to demand higher wages from the club. it made for a turbulent 2021 summer for Bayern in which players like Joshua Kimmich and Leon Goretzka were constantly linked with a move away until Bayern finally agreed to renew their contracts and bring their salary up to the same level of their new signings like Leroy Sane and Lucas Hernandez.

This could very well be the start of Bayern’s problems as players like Serge Gnabry who arguably has a much bigger impact on Bayern’s success than Leroy Sane but gets paid half his salary, will demand much bigger contracts too. Sane’s current contract runs till the summer of 2025 and the left-footed winger gets paid around a whopping

£300k

a week which rounds to

15.5 million Euros

in yearly wages.

The fact that Sane is one of the highest paid Bundesliga players in 2021 has had a negative impact on his reception at Bayern as well and has put pressure on him especially since ha hasn’t had the best of starts at Bayern Munich.

2. Manuel Neuer

Manuel Neuer is considered by many to be one of the greatest

of all time. Bayern Munich’s skipper has been at the club since the 2011 when he joined the Bavarian giants from Schalke 04. Since then he has won every trophy under the sun with Bayern as well as winning the 2014 World Cup with Germany so he is very much the type of player that totally deserves to be one of the highest paid highest paid players in Bundesliga.

Neuer, who was part of a golden generation of young talents at Schalke that had the likes of Mesut Ozil and Ivan Rakitic join Bayern Munich at the start of the last decade and has helped Bayern once again transform into a force to be reckoned with in Europe. He is one of the few players, alongside several of his teammates, to have ever won 2 Trebles in European football. this alongside him revolutionizing the goalkeeping position by being hugely influential in the creation of the ‘sweeper keeper’ role makes Neuer one of the most sought after goalkeepers of his generation.

Naturally, for Bayern to retain his services, they must pay him according to his incredible stature and list of achievements. Which is why he is one of the

highest earner in Bundesliga

and is only behind Robert Lewandowski amongst the highest paid Bundesliga players in 2021 by being paid

£315k

in weekly wages which is around

£16,380,000

in a year. Neuer’s current contract runs out at the end of the next season, so it’ll be interesting to see if Bayern will offer him another one especially since hell be almost 37 by then.

1. Robert Lewandowski

Robert Lewandowski is without a doubt one of the best players of the last decade with him only being behind Leo Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo in term of achievements. The Polish goal machine is one of the most complete and fiercest strikers that the world has ever seen as his hunger for goals and success is never satiated. Lewa was great at Dortmund but since joining Bayern Munich on a free transfer in 2014, he has taken his game to a whole new level. Something which he seems to do season after season.

There has been much said about Robert Lewandowski in recent years. suffice it to say that Lewa has become Bayern and Bundesliga’s 2nd best goal scorer behind the

since he joined the Bavarians in 2014. He has scored 298 goals for Bayern Munich in 332 matches and 4 Bundesliga Player of the Season award as well as 4 Bundesliga top scorer award in his time at Bayern as well as winning 7 Bundesliga titles and 3 DFB-Pkals in addition to a Champions League title in 2020.

As a player there hasn’t been anything that Lewandowski hasn’t conquered at Bayern Munich. He is truly both Bayern Munich and Bundesliga’s best player and some would even argue he is Europe’s best too after scoring 41 goals in 29 matches last season. so it’s only right that he is paid accordingly as he is

highest paid Bundesliga players in 2021

by a country mile, getting paid a reported

£18,252,000

in wages which would be around

£351k

in weekly wages.

This might make him the highest earner in Bundesliga but when you look at the numbers that the highest paid players in other leagues have, Lewandowski isn’t really on outrageous wages which is a plus for Bayern and Bundesliga in general as his salary could very well cap all the other players.

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