Kiliann Sildillia (19), Noah Weißhaupt (19), Kevin Schade (19), Nishan Burkart (21), Kimberly Ezekwem (20) and Noah Atubolu (19) will be part of the first-team squad for the upcoming Bundesliga season. 

"Each of these players have a lot of potential and contributed strong performances to the success of our reserve team last season. That why this is a deserved and logical next step, as part of our philosophy as a club," said chairman Jochen Saier. "They will now need to continue to work hard in order to get used to the higher level of play and to showcase their talents. They should be excited but also patient and willing to work hard to use this opportunity. We are very happy that we will be able to offer them more chances to gain valuable playing time, also with our reserves being in the 3. Liga." 

While Kiliann Sildillia (defender), Noah Weißhaupt (midfielder) and Kevin Schade (attacker) already regularly trained with the first team last season, Nishan Burkart (attacker), Kimberly Ezekwem (defender) and Noah Atubolu (goalkeeper) will now also be part of the first-team, after having occasionally trained with the side before. All six will take part in pre-season with the team, which begins on 5th July. 

Sporting director Klemens Hartenbach is pleased that the work of Freiburg's football school is bearing fruit, saying "The fact that we have 12 players in our first team squad that have spent time in our football school is a great symbol of the work done by all the employees and coaches in Freiburg's football school. I would like to highlight academy head Andreas Steiert, our academy sporting direcotr Martin Schweitzer, chief scout Christoph Wetzel and interim coach Julian Schuster for their contributions to this achievement." 

Photos: Achim Keller