Welcome to the Bundesliga, Elversberg! Historic first promotion to top flight secured
Elversberg will play in the Bundesliga for the first time next season after securing automatic promotion on the final day of the 2025/26 Bundesliga 2 campaign. Here is everything you need to know about the top-flight newcomers...
The story of 2025/26
After narrowly missing out on promotion last season as they lost to Heidenheim in the last minute of their two-legged relegation play-off, Elversberg entered the new campaign without head coach Horst Steffen and top scorer Fisnik Asllani, who both left the club in the off-season. However, they quickly dusted themselves off, appointed Vincent Wagner and set about achieving their ultimate goal.
The Saarland-based club roared out of the traps, winning seven out of their first nine games to move to the top of the table. One win in their subsequent five saw them drop down to third, but they have never been lower than fourth all campaign. They scored a league-high 64 goals, and got over the line in second thanks to a 3-0 win over Preußen Münster on the final day.
Watch: The moment Elversberg secure promotion!
In front of their own supporters, Elversberg have been close to imperious, losing just twice, while champions Schalke are the only side to have conceded fewer than their 39 goals.
It would have been easy for Elversberg to wilt after going so close to promotion last season, but they have shown fantastic resilience and can now look forward to joining the big time.
Upon Elversberg's promotion, DFL managing directors Marc Lenz and Steffen Merkel said, "In Elversberg, we welcome the 59th member in the history of the Bundesliga - heartfelt congratulations on a well-deserved promotion. To make the leap from the Regionalliga all the way to the top tier in a mere five years is an extraordinary achievement.
"Our congratulations go to the team, the coaching staff led by Vincent Wagner, the club leadership headed by President Dominik Holzer, as well as all the club’s employees and fans!"
Key player: Lukas Petkov
Elversberg suffered another setback in January when top scorer Younes Ebnoutalib moved to Eintracht Frankfurt. In his absence, though, Petkov has stepped into the breach to keep the team's attack purring. He has scored 11 goals in the second half of the season, also chipping in with six assists over the campaign.
Honourable mentions must go to the likes of Tom Zimmerschied and goalkeeper Nicolas Kristof, the latter of whom has played every single minute of the club's promotion push.
Coach: Vincent Wagner
Steffen's move to Werder Bremen last summer left Wagner with big shoes to fill, but he has performed impressively well. A lower-league centre-back as a player, the 40-year-old spent the early years of his coaching career working with the youth teams at Bochum, Duisburg and Rot-Weiß Essen before becoming assistant coach with the latter's senior side.
His first taste of a top job came with Hoffenheim II, whom he joined in 2022. After narrowly missing out on promotion to the third division in 2022/23 and 2023/24, they finally did so in 2024/25, upon which Wagner switched to Elversberg and led them into a historic promotion charge at the first time of asking.
History
From a town of just over 13,000 inhabitants, Elversberg have long been punching above their weight. Formed in 1907, 2025/26 was just their third-ever second-tier campaign, while they have only played two third-division seasons in their history.
Steffen's arrival in 2018 was a real catalyst, as Elversberg achieved back-to-back promotions in 2021/22 and 2022/23 to move up to Bundesliga 2, securing an 11th-placed finish in their first season at that level. In the DFB Cup, they have never gone past the second round, although they have won the local Saarland Cup on eight occasions.
Stadium
Elversberg moved into their current stadium, the 10,000-capacity Ursapharm-Arena an der Kaiserlinde, in 1983. It is named after an almost 100-year-old lime tree (Linde) that unfortunately fell in 2015.
