And breathe. Phew! The 2025/26 season has wrapped up and we now know exactly what next year’s Premier League landscape will look like. Coventry, Ipswich and Hull will all be attempting to replicate the success of Leeds and Sunderland by breaking the seemingly unavoidable curse of promoted clubs heading straight back down. Likewise, Leeds themselves will be desperate to avoid the fate that ultimately swallowed Wolves and West Ham this season.
More importantly, however, the club must avoid repeating the mistakes of that second summer transfer window under Marcelo Bielsa.
This summer actually bears some striking similarities to that ill-begotten period. Once again, Leeds enter the window from a position of relative strength following a successful first season back in the Premier League. Thankfully, this time around we’re not yet being told the club already spent “two transfer windows’ worth” of money twelve months earlier.
The major difference now is that Leeds are no longer relying solely on the genius of Bielsa to elevate players beyond their natural level. Daniel Farke’s squad already possesses a genuinely strong Premier League core. This summer is less about survival and more about evolution: moving on players lingering around the periphery of the squad and replacing them with genuine quality capable of raising the ceiling once again. Nick Hammond has once again been linked with a return to Leeds United this summer and, if true, I have little doubt the 49ers will task him with generating fees for some of the club’s more “unsellable” assets.
So where exactly are Leeds heading into this summer? Predictably, large sections of the fanbase reacted furiously online following the final-day defeat to West Ham. Daniel Farke in particular attracted much of the criticism, with supporters frustrated that Leeds potentially missed out on additional Premier League prize money by failing to finish above Everton and Newcastle.
And while that frustration is understandable, it’s also important to maintain some perspective. Farke and his squad have already delivered significantly beyond expectations. With the 49ers reportedly budgeting around a 17th-place finish, Leeds instead secured 14th place and, according to reports, banked approximately £144.5 million in Premier League revenue. Cha-ching! With the bank balance looking healthy, it’s only right that we look at a new, shiny player.
The Striker: Jonathan Burkardt
Jonathan Burkardt is an interesting one for me because he doesn’t immediately scream “striker who gets supporters out of their seats”. Check out his YouTube highlights and you’ll not find outrageous compilations of him scoring bicycle kicks from 30 yards. Nor is he built like Dominic Calvert-Lewin. And he certainly isn’t the type of player who arrives with a social media announcement that causes half the fanbase to lose their minds.
In fact, I suspect if Leeds signed him tomorrow, a fair number of supporters would initially be left scratching their heads thinking “never heard of him”. And yet, the more I’ve looked into him, the more I’ve found myself warming to the idea. In fact, loving the idea. Because football teams need more than a five minute highlights package on YouTube (as much as I admittedly love those). They need players who make everything work, and Burkardt is one of those players. According to FotMob, Burkardt finished the season with:
Eintracht Frankfurt – 2025/26 Bundesliga
- 13 goals (11th overall)
- 1 assist (211th overall)
- 7.03 FotMob rating (84th overall)
- .87 goals per 90 (2nd overall)
- .81 xG per 90 (2nd overall)
Mainz – 2024/25 Bundesliga
- 18 goals (4th overall)
- 2 assists (98th overall)
- 7.21 FotMob rating (49th overall)
- .76 goals per 90 (5th overall)
- .63 xG per 90 (11th overall)
At first glance, 13 Bundesliga goals doesn’t sound particularly spectacular. In fact, for a player likely to cost well over £30m, those numbers are incredibly underwhelming. But context matters. Burkardt only played 22 league matches last season due to injury, meaning his goals-per-game return was excellent. He then lost his place to Kalimuendo towards the back end of the season. Dig a little deeper and the numbers become even more encouraging. According to FotMob, he ranked second only to Harry Kane for goals per 90 and expected goals per 90. That’s not the profile of a striker surviving on hot finishing streaks. That’s the profile of a player consistently getting himself into good positions. And that’s probably the best place to start with Burkardt. He’s intelligent. Very intelligent. And at only 25, he’s about to hit his peak years.
POSITIONAL PROFILE
Primary Role
- Striker
Secondary Roles
- Second striker in front two
PLAYER PROFILE
Burkardt is 25 (26 on July 11th) and is contracted to Eintracht Frankfurt until 2030 after joining from Mainz last summer. He came through the Mainz academy, made his Bundesliga debut in 2018, and ended up leaving as captain having scored 45 goals in 144 senior appearances for the club. He is very much a Mainz player in the sense that he was not some quick flip or random breakout season. He had been there for years, worked his way through, and became one of the faces of the side before Frankfurt took him. Personally, I think signing for Eintracht was very much a seal of approval for the player. They’re a club who are becoming more and more known for their intelligent recruitment, and banking on Burkardt was a sign of their confidence in the German player.
Burkardt is a centre-forward who presses, runs, attacks the box and generally looks like a nuisance to play against. He’s at his best when he can move. He’s not really a stand-there number nine waiting for crosses to be lumped onto his forehead, and he’s not dropping into midfield trying to run the game either. He wants to work across the line, drift into the channels, spin in behind and attack the near post. A lot of his game is about making defenders uncomfortable. Follow him and you leave space. Stay where you are and he can get free. It’s not flashy, but it is clever, and a lot of his goals come from that sort of movement rather than from doing anything spectacular. According to Opta, the Premier League player most similar to Burkardt is Ollie Watkins which should give Leeds fans a sense of the type of player he is.
There are obvious concerns however, mainly around injuries. He lost a big chunk of time at Mainz with a serious knee problem and there have been smaller issues around that too, so it would be daft to ignore it. But as a striker, you can see why he appeals. He works hard, he moves well, he presses, and he has already shown he can score goals at Bundesliga level.
For Leeds, the fit is fairly easy to understand. He would not be a like-for-like Calvert-Lewin replacement because he does not give you that same aerial presence or that big, physical focal-point stuff. But if Leeds want a striker who can press from the front, stretch games with his movement and still carry a goal threat, Burkardt makes a lot of sense. Andy there are other similarities that can give us cause for excitement. I’ve deliberately left out the aerial duels percentages in this comparison as Burkardt simply isn’t that style of player, but look at the other metrics to see how well he compares to Calvert-Lewin.
PRESSING PROFILE
Leeds supporters spent years watching Patrick Bamford lead the press under Marcelo Bielsa in the Championship. We then signed Spanish international Rodrigo in our first summer back in the Premier League, and we still watched Patrick Bamford lead the press. Ugh. Put simply, recruitment just has to be better this time. Luckily for us, there’s no Victor Orta or Andrea Radrizzani – two men known for being blinded by shiny toys – and the 49ers hit-rate has been remarkably high. Calvert-Lewin turned out to be a stroke of genius, and he has led the press particularly well from the front.
And whilst Burkardt is a different player stylistically to someone like Calvert-Lewin, there are similarities in how seriously they take their defensive responsibilities. What I like is that he does not just sprint at people for the sake of it. We have all seen forwards who do that. They charge around, the crowd applauds the effort, and nothing actually happens. Burkardt’s pressing feels far more deliberate than that.
He knows when to go. He knows when to shut off the simple pass. He knows how to make a defender feel rushed. It is not just effort for the sake of effort. There is a point to it. At Leeds Farke asks a lot of his striker without the ball. The centre-forward has to do more than score. He has to start things. He has to make life awkward. He has to help the rest of the side stay compact behind him. Take a look at Piroe – great goal scorer at Championship level, but he didn’t really offer anything other than that. It’s why the club will cash in on him this summer as he simply isn’t able to do what Farke wants from his strikers. Burkardt, on the other hand, looks like the sort of striker who gets that.
The other obvious difference, of course, is that Burkardt actually looks like a reliable goalscorer as well. So you are not just getting a nice lad who works hard and sets the tone. You are getting somebody who can press properly and still carry a real threat in the box.
ATHLETICISM
Burkardt is not physically dominant in the Dominic Calvert-Lewin mould and he is not the sort of striker who is going to spend 90 minutes backing into centre-backs and trying to win everything in the air. At roughly 5’11” that was never really going to be his game. What he does have is good acceleration, a decent burst over short distances and, probably most importantly, the engine to keep making the same runs over and over again.
Bundesliga’s own profile on him talks about his pace and energy, and that tracks with the eye test as well. He is a mobile striker first and foremost. The obvious caveat is the injury history. He lost a huge chunk of time at Mainz with a serious knee problem and has had smaller interruptions around that, so you cannot really discuss his athletic profile without mentioning that. But in terms of what he actually looks like on the pitch, Burkardt’s game is far more about sharp movement, repeat sprints and work-rate than sheer size or brute force.
GOAL THREAT
This is where the Burkardt case becomes properly interesting. The headline numbers are already good enough on their own: 18 Bundesliga goals for Mainz in 2024/25, followed by 13 in his first Frankfurt league season despite only playing 1,340 Bundesliga minutes. But the bigger point for me is the sort of goalscorer he looks to be. He is not just hanging around waiting for tap-ins, nor does he need a ridiculous shot volume to stay relevant. A lot of his threat comes from timing. He attacks the six-yard box well, makes sharp near-post runs and generally seems to understand where the ball is likely to land before defenders do. FotMob had him at 0.87 goals per 90 in the Bundesliga last season, which is a very serious return even if the sample is not enormous. Bundesliga.com also made the point last year that he had become “a fearsome goal threat” again after the knee injury.
FAN OPINION
Mainz supporters clearly adored him, and that is not hard to understand. He was one of their own, came through the academy, stayed through some difficult periods, became captain and then delivered the best goalscoring season of his career after coming back from a horrible knee injury. Bundesliga’s feature on him in late 2024 is basically built around that idea of Burkardt as a fighter and a figurehead, and Mainz themselves were very open about how important his goals were to their survival push and then their rise the following year. He was not just a decent striker there. He was one of the faces of the club. Frankfurt is obviously a newer relationship, but the early signs were positive. By late 2025 Bundesliga.com were already writing about him as a quick hit at his new club after a run of eight goals in eight competitive games, and Frankfurt’s own interview with him in February 2026 also gives you a sense that he had settled well enough to be voted into the leadership group almost immediately. That does not mean every Frankfurt fan thinks he is flawless, because they do not, but it does suggest he was taken seriously very quickly. The broad picture seems pretty clear: Mainz fans saw him as one of their own and a major loss; Frankfurt fans seem to have warmed to him quickly because he works, scores and does not look out of place at all.
FINANCIAL CONTEXT
Burkardt only joined Frankfurt last summer for a fee in the region of €21 million. That will have increased following Burkardt’s strong season at Frankfurt. However, Frankfurt’s failure to qualify for any European competition next season may see them look to sell a high value asset. Although, that’s also probably been offset by the huge fee received for Nathaniel Brown this summer. Andy Hugo Ekitiké last summer. And that’s before we consider the sales of Kolo Muani and Omar Marmoush. Ethe problem for Leeds is that Eintracht do not sell cheap. For now, he may still remain more attainable than elite “stretch” forwards, but if Eintracht don’t want to sell, then the price tag will probably be too steep for Leeds.
STRENGTHS
- Movement
- Pressing
- Finishing
- Work-rate
- Channel-running
WEAKNESSES
- Aerial duels
- Injuries
- Hold-up play
- Physicality
- Self-creation
CURRENT LEVEL
I think Burkardt is already a very good striker at a very good level. Not elite. Not world class. But very good.
He’s already shown he can score goals in the Bundesliga, and not just in one random purple patch either. He hit 18 league goals for Mainz in 2024/25, then followed it up with 13 in his first Frankfurt season despite only playing 1,340 Bundesliga minutes. That is a serious return. He has also broken into the Germany squad, which tells you plenty on its own. So when I look at him now, I do not see a project or a punt. I see a striker who is already operating at a level that would help Leeds to move on up the table.
CEILING
I don’t think Burkardt’s ceiling is “one of the best strikers in Europe” but I do think he could be a very good striker for a very good side. If he stays fit and lands in the right system, I can absolutely see him being a reliable Premier League forward for a team pushing for Europe. Not because he is going to dribble through five players or score 25 goals a season, but because he does a lot of things well. He presses, he moves, he works, and he knows where the goal is. Managers tend to like players like that because they make teams function.
FLOOR
The floor is a bit awkward because there are two obvious issues sitting there. The first is the injury record. If the body lets him down again, then everything changes very quickly. The second is fit. Burkardt is not the sort of striker who is going to carry a dysfunctional side on his back through sheer physical dominance. If you stick him in a team that wants him to stand in the middle, win endless headers and spend all afternoon fighting centre-backs, I think you would get a far worse version of him. So the floor is probably a decent top-flight striker who still has value, but one who never quite looks as good as he should because the injuries or the system get in the way.
OVERALL LEEDS VERDICT
I would love Jonathan Burkardt at Leeds United. He would be a totally different option to Calvert-Lewin which would allow us to vary our style of play considerably.
A striker who with pace ✅
A striker with a proven goal scoring record ✅
A striker whose movement and intelligence causes problem ✅
For me, this is a no brainer. We’ve already got Farke and Stach. We could potentially add Brandt. Let’s make Burkardt feel at home with all the Germans. Now, it’s just down to whether Eintracht would have the appetite to sell, and if Leeds would have the finances to do the deal. Sitting here now, I hope so.
