Sven Bender (; born 27 April 1989) is a German former professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who played as a

centre-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categories: centre-backs, full-backs, sweepers ...

defensive midfielder In the sport of association football, a midfielder takes an outfield position primarily in the middle of the pitch. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. ...

. He is currently the interim manager of

3. Liga The 3. Liga is a professional association football league and the third division in Germany. In the German football league system, it is positioned between the 2. Bundesliga and the fourth-tier Regionalliga. The modern 3. Liga was formed for t ...

club

SpVgg Unterhaching Spielvereinigung Unterhaching () is a German sports club in Unterhaching, a semi-rural municipality on the southern outskirts of the Bavarian capital Munich. The club is widely known for playing in the first-division association football league ...

. He was raised in Brannenburg and started his youth career playing for TSV Brannenburg. He is the twin brother of fellow coach and former player

Lars Bender Lars Bender (; born 27 April 1989) is a German former professional Association football, footballer who played as a right back or defensive midfielder. He is currently the assistant manager of the Germany national under-17 football team, German ...

Club career

Early career

Bender played from 1993 to 1999 in the youth of the TSV Brannenburg. From 1999 to 2002, he was part of

youth teams. In summer 2002, Bender moved to the 1860 München youth team.

1860 Munich

He started his football career on the U-14 team and played for all of 1860 München's youth teams in three years. In November 2007, Bender extended his contract with the club until 2011. In 2009, Munich had to sell both Lars and Sven Bender, due to club's financial problem. Sven moved to

Borussia Dortmund Ballspielverein Borussia 09 e. V. Dortmund, often known simply as Borussia Dortmund () or by its initialism BVB (), or just Dortmund by International fans, is a German professional sports club based in Dortmund, North Rhine-Westphalia. It is ...

and Lars to

Bayer Leverkusen Bayer 04 Leverkusen, officially known as Bayer 04 Leverkusen Fußball GmbH () and commonly known as Bayer Leverkusen or simply Leverkusen, is a German professional football club based in Leverkusen, North Rhine-Westphalia. It competes in the B ...

. Sven played 65 games and scored 1 goal for 1860 Munich. In 2009, he joined Borussia Dortmund, where he signed a contract that tied him to the club until 2013.

Borussia Dortmund

Bender made his Bundesliga debut on 19 September 2009 in a game against

Hannover 96 Hannoverscher Sportverein von 1896, commonly referred to as Hannover 96 (), is a German professional association football, football club based in the city of Hanover, Lower Saxony. They played in the Bundesliga for a total of 30 years between 19 ...

. His biggest rival for the spot in the defensive midfield suffered several injuries and Bender established himself in the starting eleven very quickly. He scored his first Bundesliga goal on 12 February 2011 against

1. FC Kaiserslautern 1. Fußball-Club Kaiserslautern e. V., also known as 1. FCK, FCK (), FC Kaiserslautern (), K'lautern or colloquially Lautern (), is a German sports club based in Kaiserslautern, Rhineland-Palatinate. In addition to Association football, football ...

and extended his contract until 2017. The years 2011 and 2012 were very successful for Bender, as he was an important player in Borussia Dortmund's midfield and helped the team win the national championship in both years as well as the

DFB-Pokal The DFB-Pokal (), also known as the German Cup in English language, English, is a German knockout Association football, football cup competition held annually by the German Football Association (DFB). Sixty-four teams participate in the competiti ...

in 2012. On 6 January 2013, Bender extended his contract with Dortmund, keeping him at the club until 2017. During the 2012–13 season, he was struggling with several injuries which made Dortmund sign

Nuri Şahin Nuri Şahin (born 5 September 1988) is a German and Turkish professional football manager and former player who played as a midfielder. He was most recently head coach of Bundesliga club Borussia Dortmund. He began his playing career at Dortmun ...

in January 2013. After treatment of his injury, Bender got another opponent for his position. He was on his way to becoming the number one player on his position and shared a place with team's captain

Sebastian Kehl Sebastian Walter Kehl (; born 13 February 1980) is a German former professional association football, footballer who played as a defensive midfielder. He is currently the Sporting director, Sporting Director of Borussia Dortmund. He amassed Bund ...

and helped the team to reach 2013 UEFA Champions League Final, although they were defeated by their domestic rivals

Bayern Munich Fußball-Club Bayern München e. V. (FCB, ), commonly known as Bayern Munich (), FC Bayern () or simply Bayern, is a German professional sports club based in Munich, Bavaria. They are most known for their men's professional football team, ...

. On 27 July 2013, Bender won the 2013 DFL-Supercup with Dortmund 4–2 against Bayern Munich. In February 2014, he suffered injury after a loss against

Hamburger SV Hamburger Sport-Verein e.V. (), commonly known as Hamburger SV () or Hamburg (), or HSV (), is a German sports club based in Hamburg, with its largest branch being its Association football, football department. Though the current HSV was founde ...

, which eventually ruled him out for the rest season. On 21 February 2016, Bender signed a contract extension to keep him at the club until 2021.

Bayer Leverkusen

On 13 July 2017, Bender ended his eight-year tenure at Borussia Dortmund, signing a four-year contract with

until July 2021 and re-uniting with his brother Lars. Sven and Lars both announced their departures from Leverkusen and their retirement from football after the end of the 2020–21 season.

International career

Bender with the Germany national team in 2016 against Brazil At the under-19 level, Bender was a part of the team that won the 2008 European Under-19 Championship. He and his twin brother Lars were named jointly as players of the tournament. Bender made his debut for the senior team in a friendly match against

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

in March 2011. He appeared in several more friendly games and nominated for the

Euro 2012 The 2012 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as UEFA Euro 2012 or simply Euro 2012, was the 14th European Championship for men's national football teams organised by UEFA. The final tournament, held between 8 June and 1 ...

but did not make the squad's final. In February 2014, Bender suffered an

Osteitis pubis Osteitis pubis is a noninfectious inflammation of the pubic symphysis (also known as the pubis symphysis, symphysis pubis, or symphysis pubica), causing varying degrees of lower abdominal and pelvic pain. Osteitis pubis was first described in pat ...

injury that ruled him out for the

2014 FIFA World Cup The 2014 FIFA World Cup was the 20th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for list of men's national association football teams, men's national Association football, football teams organised by FIFA. It took place in Brazil fr ...

. His last internationals therefore were two friendlies in late 2013. In mid-July on 2016, despite not being called up for the senior team since 2013, he made the spot for Germany Olympic football team for the

2016 Summer Olympics The 2016 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXXI Olympiad () and officially branded as Rio 2016, were an international multi-sport event held from 5 to 21 August 2016 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, with preliminary events i ...

as one of three over 23 years old players along with his brother and

Nils Petersen Nils Petersen (; born 6 December 1988) is a German former professional association football, footballer who played as a forward (association football), forward. He appeared in the 2016 Summer Olympics and remains the first and only German footbal ...

, where Germany won the silver medal.

Coaching career

In June 2022, the German Football Association appointed him as the new assistant coach of the Germany U-16 national team. During the summer of 2023, he became assistant coach of the German U-17s. On 29 December 2023 left his job at the

German Football Association The German Football Association ( ; DFB ) is the governing body of Association football, football, futsal, and beach soccer in Germany. A founding member of both FIFA and UEFA, the DFB has jurisdiction for the German football league system and ...

and, along with his past teammate

, was appointed as assistant manager to Edin Terzić at their former club Borussia Dortmund, signing a contract until the end of the

season A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's axial tilt, tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperat ...

. He became the interim head coach of

in December 2024 for the remainder of the year. He took over the same role in March 2025.

Career statistics

Club

Personal life

On 20 June 2015, Bender married Simone Dettendorfer, his long time girlfriend since 2008.

Honours

;Borussia Dortmund *

Bundesliga The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany and the highest level of the German football league system. The Bundesliga comprises 18 teams ...

2010–11 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...

, 2011–12 *

: 2011–12, 2016–17 *

DFL-Supercup The Franz Beckenbauer Supercup or ''German Super Cup'' is a one-off association football, football match in Germany that features the winners of the Bundesliga championship and the DFB-Pokal. The competition is run by the Deutsche Fußball Liga (E ...

2013 2013 was the first year since 1987 to contain four unique digits (a span of 26 years). 2013 was designated as: *International Year of Water Cooperation *International Year of Quinoa Events January * January 5 – 2013 Craig, Alask ...

2014 The year 2014 was marked by the surge of the Western African Ebola epidemic, West African Ebola epidemic, which began in 2013, becoming the List of Ebola outbreaks, most widespread outbreak of the Ebola, Ebola virus in human history, resul ...

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by List of top-division football clubs in UEFA countries, top-divisio ...

runner-up: 2012–13 ;Germany *

UEFA European Under-19 Championship The UEFA European Under-19 Championship, or simply the Euro Under-19, is an annual football competition, contested by the European men's under-19 national teams of the UEFA member associations. Spain is the most successful team in this competit ...

2008 2008 was designated as: *International Year of Languages *International Year of Planet Earth *International Year of the Potato *International Year of Sanitation The Great Recession, a worldwide recession which began in 2007, continued throu ...

Summer Olympic Games The Summer Olympic Games, also known as the Summer Olympics or the Games of the Olympiad, is a major international multi-sport event normally held once every four years. The 1896 Summer Olympics, inaugural Games took place in 1896 in Athens, ...

: Silver Medal,

2016 2016 was designated as: * International Year of Pulses by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly. * International Year of Global Understanding (IYGU) by the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Internationa ...

Individual *

Fritz Walter Medal The Fritz Walter Medal is a series of annual awards given by the German Football Association to youth footballers in Germany. First awarded in 2005, it is named in honour of Fritz Walter, captain of West Germany's 1954 FIFA World Cup-winning team ...

U17 Bronze Medal 2006 * UEFA European Under-19 Football Championship Golden Player:

References

External links

* * * * * *
Kicker profile

Bundesliga profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bender, Sven 1989 births Living people German twins Footballers from Rosenheim Men's association football central defenders Men's association football midfielders German men's footballers Germany men's international footballers Germany men's youth international footballers Bundesliga players 2. Bundesliga players 3. Liga players Regionalliga players TSV 1860 Munich II players TSV 1860 Munich players Borussia Dortmund players Borussia Dortmund II players Bayer 04 Leverkusen players Footballers at the 2016 Summer Olympics Olympic footballers for Germany Medalists at the 2016 Summer Olympics Olympic silver medalists for Germany Olympic medalists in football German football coaches Borussia Dortmund non-playing staff 21st-century German sportsmen SpVgg Unterhaching managers 3. Liga managers