Sardar Azmoun has been reportedly excluded from Bayer Leverkusen’s squad. Bayer Leverkusen coach Xabi Alonso has withdrawn Azmoun from first-team training. The reason is that the Iranian, who spent last season on loan at Roma, turned up late for training preparations for the new season and was in poor physical condition.

Having returned from his loan to Roma, in fact, the Iranian striker’s new adventure in Leverkusen did not start in the best of ways.

According to Bild, the former Giallorossi player missed a training session, justifying his absence only after the end of the session.

This angered Xabi Alonso, who immediately decided to take him out of the squad. In the next few days, therefore, Azmoun will train individually.

In an interview, Simon Rolfes, Leverkusen sporting director, commented on the incident: “We need to clarify what happened. It’s not enough to do performance analysis, you also need to train. Yesterday it was there, today it wasn’t. We’ll see in the next few days.”

Azmoun’s late report to the training camp of Bayer Leverkusen was taken without prior permission of the club. The Team Melli forward is already on a shakey ground with Xabi Alonso who does not see the Iranian fitting into his squad.

The player has been linked with Sevilla, who seem more interested in a loan move. In German media, there is also talk of interest from teams in Qatar and Saudi Arabia Azmoun joined Leverkusen in 2022 from Zenit St. Petersburg for 2.5 million euros.

The high asking price for Azmoun by Leverkusen deters many clubs from taking him on board including Fenerbahce and Sevilla.

The only chance of Azmoun making the squad and gaining the confidence of Alonso is by doubling his effort in training, or else he will stay a bench warmer or make a cameo appearance with the defending champions of the Bundesliga.