Update: Leon Goretzka looks set to sign new, long-term contract at Bayern Munich

There is good news on the contract renewal front for Bayern Munich. It now looks like Leon Goretzka is leaning towards signing a new deal with the club just after Joshua Kimmich made the decision to do so.

Per Sport1’s Florian Plettenberg in his “Meine Bayern Woche” podcast as well as Sky Germany, it looks like talks with Goretzka have shown positive signs and Plettenberg surmises the deal will be for 4-5 years.

Throughout the summer thus far, negotiations between Goretzka, his camp, and Bayern have been rather slow and not much progress had been made even after he returned from his post-Euro 2020 holiday. There have been different suitors abroad monitoring his contract situation, ready to make an offer, but things finally look like they’re moving in the right direction after the news that an agreement with Kimmich is on the verge of being reached.

While Goretzka might not get a salary as high as Kimmich’s with his renewal, Sky’s Max Bielefeld still feels that Kimmich’s deal is crucial for the completion of Goretzka’s. “It’s a great sign to Leon that his buddy has extended to six,” Bielefeld said. He’s also had positive discussions with Julian Nagelsmann, which has helped him lean towards signing a new deal with the club.

Photo by Matthias Balk/picture alliance via Getty Images

For Bayern, getting a new deal done with Goretzka is absolutely vital. His contract expires next June and he could leave the club on a free transfer is a new contract isn’t signed. He could even sign a pre-agreement to leave Bayern in the winter if a new deal isn’t reached by then. That would be the absolute last thing Bayern would want.

There has been concrete interest from Ole Gunnar Solskjær’s Manchester United — and speculation about Real Madrid — in signing Goretzka, so the thought could always be in the back of the midfielder’s mind that a move abroad is entirely conceivable. The complications of the wage structure at Bayern haven’t made matters any easier, but now seems that an agreement is inevitable and it’s just a matter of time.