Freiburg confirm Ghana international Daniel-Kofi Kyereh will leave the club this summer
SC Freiburg have confirmed that Daniel-Kofi Kyereh will depart the club at the end of the 2025/26 season.
The German club have opted not to exercise the option in the midfielder's contract, and so the 30-year-old will leave the Europa-Park Stadion as a free agent this summer.
Speaking at a farewell ceremony organised by the club in-front of over 8,000 fans, the Ghanain thanked the German club for their continuous support.
“Still, though, I am happy about my time in Freiburg. The team has always supported me, and recently I was taken aback by how the lads in the U23s welcomed me.”
Freiburg paid €4.5 million to sign Kyereh from FC St. Pauli in the summer of 2022. In his final season at St. Pauli, Kyereh scored 13 goals and provided 11 assists in 32 games.
Born in Cologne to Ghanaian parents, Kyereh was raised in Germany arrived in Breisgau as one of the most exciting attacking midfielders in the country.
His form at St. Pauli earned him his debut call-up to the Ghana national team. Kyereh made an immediate impact in the Bundesliga, debuting as a substitute in Freiburg's 4-1 home win over Union Berlin on 6 August 2022.
His early promise continued with his first league goal, scored in a 2-1 victory against Mainz 05 on 1 October 2022, followed five days later by his maiden Europa League strike in a 2-0 group-stage win versus Nantes.
The two October goals arrived just in time to cement his place in Ghana's 2022 World Cup squad in Qatar, where he earned his 18th cap and represented his country on the game's biggest stage.
Kyereh last played for Ghana on December 2, 2022, against Uruguay at the FIFA World Cup. Neither he nor anyone watching could have known at the time that it would prove to be his final international appearance or that the next three-and-a-half years of his career would be defined almost entirely by injury and rehabilitation.
The Injury that changed everything
On 9 February 2023, Kyereh suffered a torn anterior cruciate ligament during a training session with Freiburg.
It was his second ACL injury of his career, having suffered the same injury at the age of 19 during his time at TSV Havelse.
Freiburg confirmed Kyereh was continuing his rehabilitation in Barcelona, with then-head coach Christian Streich describing his recovery as a staircase making progress one step at a time, but experiencing setbacks along the way.
He missed the entire remainder of the 2022/23 season, the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations in Côte d'Ivoire, and Freiburg's Europa League campaign.
Kyereh resumed training with the first team in July 2024, having been away from football for 20 months.
However, during Freiburg's pre-season camp in Schruns, problems with the injured knee resurfaced after increased strain, and the club confirmed that a surgical procedure would be required to assess how further treatment could be continued.
The relapse, confirmed in July 2024, sent Kyereh back to square one as he underwent a second operation, a second rehabilitation, a second wait of indefinite length.
In total, Kyereh had been out of action for close to 975 days across the entirety of the injury period. By any measure, it is one of the most extended and painful absences in recent Ghanaian football.
The return
The good news is that Kyereh has finally returned to competitive football. His appearance with Freiburg's U23 side in the Regionalliga Südwest was a genuinely emotional milestone for the 30-year-old, with coach Julian Schuster confirming he had been back in team training for some time before the competitive reintegration began.
Since April, Kyereh has netted two goals and provided two assists in seven matches for the U23s, including a goal and an assist in a 4-0 victory over Mainz 05's reserves.
Despite his injury struggles, he retains 18 caps for Ghana and has expressed his desire to feature at the 2026 World Cup in North America.
His recent form with the U23s is expected to attract interest from several clubs across Europe during the summer transfer window.
Former Freiburg coach Christian Streich once described Kyereh as "a player who makes football joyful." That description still holds. The question now is which club will give him the platform to prove it again at first-team level.