German international twins and Bayer Leverkusen defenders Lars and Sven Bender will retire from professional football at the end of the 2020/21 season, the club have confirmed.
The 31year old brothers started their professional careers at 1860 Munich but went separate ways in 2009 when Sven joined Borussia Dortmund and Lars joined Bayer Leverkusen.
The two reunited in 2017 when Sven signed for Bayer Leverkusen. They have now decided it’s time to call it quits on their professional careers.
Sven has seven caps for the German national team while Lars has 19 caps and both represented Germany at the 2016 Rio Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil where Germany won the silver medal.
“Everyone who knows us knows that we give 100% every day. That was always the basic requirement for us. Unfortunately, it is becoming increasingly difficult for us to continuously access this with all the pain and physical problems from which we are suffering more and more.” pic.twitter.com/5etblLBlDW
— Bayer 04 Leverkusen (@bayer04_en) December 21, 2020