Felix Keidel: Klopp's Bold Choice for Right-Back

When Jürgen Klopp sat down for his first press conference as Germany head coach, he didn’t bother with sentimentality. The slate was wiped clean. Reputation, past tournaments, old hierarchies – all pushed to the side. Only performance, form and work rate would matter.

He even put a number on the revolution: 57 players on his initial shortlist. Most of those names stayed behind closed doors, but it was clear from the outset he was casting the net wider than his predecessors, willing to consider players the DFB had never previously touched. After three failed World Cup campaigns, Germany needed more than a tweak. It needed shock therapy.

Now one of the shocks has a name: Felix Keidel.

Late on Tuesday, Bild reported that the 23-year-old SV Elversberg player had received an invitation from Klopp. A day later, kicker backed it up with its own information. No leaks, no slow build. Just a bolt from the blue.

Keidel’s nomination is a genuine surprise. He has only three Bundesliga appearances to his name. Barely any experience at the highest level. Yet he now finds himself on the brink of the national team.

From Ingolstadt Youth to the Bundesliga in Two Years

Keidel’s story starts far from the DFB spotlight. He joined FC Ingolstadt’s U19s in 2012 and climbed through every youth side until he finally reached the professional squad in the summer of 2022.

Once there, he didn’t lurk on the fringes for long. At just 20, he established himself as a regular in the 3. Liga, making 37 appearances, scoring once and adding four assists. Solid numbers, but more importantly, he showed he could handle the rhythm and physicality of senior football.

The real leap came in 2025. Elversberg, still stinging from narrowly missing out on promotion against 1. FC Heidenheim, were rebuilding and saw something in him. They paid a modest €400,000 to buy him out of his Ingolstadt contract – a small fee in modern football, but a clear statement of intent for a club trying to punch above its weight.

Again, Keidel settled almost instantly. Under coach Vincent Wagner, he became a regular, making 25 league appearances, 13 of them starts. He didn’t just fill a shirt. He became a key figure as the Saarland club pulled off a sensational promotion to the Bundesliga at the end of the season.

In a little over two years, he had climbed from Germany’s third tier to the top flight.

This season, the sample size at the highest level remains tiny, but eye-catching. Three Bundesliga matches – against Leverkusen, Gladbach and, most recently, Bayern – have already brought him one goal. He also featured in the DFB Cup against MSV Duisburg and finished that tie with two assists.

That short run, combined with his profile, has clearly been enough for Klopp. The new national coach has seen enough to at least bring him into the fold and take a closer look.

The Utility Man Who Might Fix a Long-Running Problem

What makes Keidel so intriguing is not just his rise, but the way he plays. Klopp has spoken repeatedly about intensity and flexibility, and Keidel brings both.

At Ingolstadt, he was almost a one-man toolkit. Coach Sabrina Wittmann, one of his biggest backers, used him all over the pitch. Both full-back roles? He played them. Central midfield? He did that too. Need a playmaker higher up, drifting into the half-spaces? Keidel stepped in there as well.

His natural position is right-back in a back four, but he has built his career by adapting, plugging gaps, and handling whatever role the team demanded.

After his move to Elversberg, his responsibilities shifted slightly deeper. During the promotion season he mainly operated at right-back, giving the side balance and stability on that flank. Now, Wagner often deploys him in defensive midfield alongside Lukasz Poreba, trusting his reading of the game and work rate in front of the back line.

For Klopp, though, the picture is likely clearer: Keidel is primarily a candidate for right-back.

Germany’s Long Search on the Right

Germany have been searching for a convincing, long-term solution at right-back ever since Philipp Lahm retired and Joshua Kimmich moved permanently into midfield. The position has become a recurring headache for national coaches.

Hansi Flick and Julian Nagelsmann both cycled through options. Benjamin Henrichs and Ridle Baku at RB Leipzig, Josha Vagnoman at Stuttgart, even Kimmich himself briefly moved back to the flank at the 2026 World Cup. None of those experiments truly stuck. Most were quietly shelved after short trials.

The result: German football is still hunting for a reliable, high-quality right-back in a back four. Someone who can own the position for years, not just fill it for a tournament.

Is Felix Keidel really that player? That’s the gamble.

He is 23. He has only just arrived in the Bundesliga. He has three top-flight games and one cup tie this season. On paper, that résumé would not usually be enough to break into a national team still carrying the weight of its own expectations.

But this is Klopp’s reset. Old rules are being rewritten.

What Keidel offers is clear: versatility, tactical intelligence, the ability to slide between roles without fuss. He has climbed every step of his career by adapting quickly and never shrinking from a bigger stage.

Whether that now scales up to international level is the next question. Germany’s right flank has been a problem for years. Klopp has decided it is time to try a different kind of answer.

Perhaps, of all people, it will be the late bloomer from Ingolstadt and Elversberg who finally makes that position his own.