Freiburg has spent nine of the last 10 seasons in the Bundesliga having bounced straight back up from relegation in 2015/16. In that time they have finished in the top half three times with their best campaign seeing them finish fifth in 2012/13. They finished 13th last season which was an improvement on 15th the year before.
Transfer Business Overview
Freiburg will be relatively happy with their business this summer having spent €14 million on four players while holding onto their stars but bringing in close to €5 million to help balance the books.
Two South Koreans have arrived in the shape of Woo-yeong Jeong from Bayern Munich's second string and Chang-hun Kwon from Dijon. Other arrivals include Jonathan Schmid from Augsburg and Luca Itter from Wolfsburg while Fabian Rudlin, Christoph Daferner, Niclas Thiede and Nico Schlotterbeck have all been promoted from within.
Leaving the club are Florian Niederlechner (Augsburg), Vincent Sierro (Young Boys), Jonas Fohrenbach (Heidenheim) and Fabian Schleusener (Nuremberg) while Christoph Daferner, Kevin Schlotterbeck, Chima Okoroji, Constantin Frommann and Pascal Stenzel have all departed on loan.
Manager
Christian Streich has been employed as a coach at Freiburg since 1995. He spent 16 years as a youth team coach where he had some great success producing players that helped him win three Junior DFB Cups and one Under-19 league title.
In 2007, he was promoted to assistant manager of the first team but also continued his role with the academy right up until 2011 when he was appointed first-team manager. He has been there ever since and is the Bundesliga's longest-serving manager having been at Freiburg at least twice as long as any other top-flight boss in Germany.
Player to Watch
Luca Waldschmidt was sublime for the Germany U21 side as they reached the final of the UEFA U21 Championships this summer. He scored seven goals in the tournament which is the most any player has ever scored in the competition.
At 23 years old, he's already been around a few clubs with spells at Hamburg and Eintracht Frankfurt but he seems to have finally found his feet with Freiburg. In his first season with the club, he netted nine goals and will be confident of improving on that after his performances in the summer.
One for the Future
Bayern Munich signed the highly rated, Woo-yeong Jeong from Incheon United in his native South Korea in 2017. He moved to Germany in 2018 and performed well for Bayern Munich II but was unable to bridge the gap to the first team and has now joined Freiburg. He's still only 19 years old and Bayern didn't get where they are by letting good talent leave the club so it's not surprising that the deal for Freiburg to sign the striker includes an option for Bayern to bring him back to Munich.
Predicted Finish
Freiburg should be good enough to avoid the drop but it's unlikely that they will be pushing up into the top half. Anywhere between 10th and 12th would be a solid season for the club and they are good enough to achieve that.