Serge Gnabry Biography

Serge David Gnabry was born on 14 July 1995, in Stuttgart, Germany, to Jean Hermann Gnabry and Birgit Gnabry. His father is of Ivorian descent while his mother is a German.

Football became a part of his life since the very beginning. At the age of four, he joined the local football club team TSV Weissach. However, he soon moved to other clubs – TSF Ditzingen, GSV Hemmingen, SpVgg Feuerbach, Stuttgarter Kickers – before joining his hometown club VfB Stuttgart in 2006.

As a youngster, Gnabry was a talented sprinter who took inspiration from Jamaican retired sprinter, Usain Bolt and aspired to rise to national level, but he eventually chose football.

Serge Gnabry played for VfB Stuttgart for around five years before he was selected to be a part of the English Premier League side Arsenal in 2010. In 2011, when he turned sixteen, he joined the Arsenal youth team and officially played for the first time in the 2011-2012 season.

For much of the season, he played for the under-18s; however, given his impressive performance, he was soon elevated to the senior team reserve. In the season, he played six games, scoring two goals.

The following season, after playing for Arsenal first team in a pre-season friendly match against FC Köln, he made his professional debut in September 2012 against Coventry City in the League Cup.

In October 2012, he made his Premier League debut against Norwich City. Gnabry was 17 years and 98 days old at the time and became the second-youngest Arsenal player to play in the Premier League after Jack Wilshere (16 years and 256 day).

A few days later, he made his debut in the UEFA Champions League in a game against Schalke 04.

In the 2013-2014 season, he scored his first professional goal playing in a League match against Swansea City. Arsenal won the match 2-1. Later, he also won a penalty playing against Crystal Palace and contributed to Arsenal’s 2–0 victory.

In total, he made a total of 14 appearances in the season including a remarkable performance against Tottenham Hotspur and Coventry, which significantly helped Arsenal to bag the FA Cup. However, the promising start was soon hampered by a serious knee injury and Gnabry ended up not playing for the Arsenal’s first team in 2014-2015 season.

In 2015 he was loaned out to West Bromwich Albion for one season; however, he only made three competitive appearances—one Premier League and two League Cup appearances—in the 2015-2016 season.

Apart from his club career, Serge Gnabry also represented Germany in its various national youth team – under-16, under-17, under-18 and U19 levels – and scored a total of 10 goals in 24 games. He was also a part of Germany U21 (2015-2017) team and scored 4 goals in 16 appearances.

In July 2016, he was included in the squad that competed in the 2016 Summer Olympics. He scored 6 goals in 6 six appearances and finished as the tournament’s joint top scorer along with Nils Petersen. Germany bagged the silver medal.

In August 2016, he moved from Arsenal to join Bundesliga side Werder Bremen. He stayed with the side for a single season making 27 league appearances and netting 11 goals.

Later, in November 2016, Gnabry, for the first time, became a part of Germany’s national team and quickly made a mark by scoring three goals against San Marino in his debut match in a 2018 World Cup qualifier. Germany defeated San Marino 8-0.

In 2017, he was a part of Germany’s U21 team that bagged the UEFA European Under-21 Championship defeating Spain.

In 2017 again, he moved from Werder Bremen to Bayern Munich and was immediately loaned out by the latter to TSG 1899 Hoffenheim on a season long loan. For the club, he netted his first two goals in December in a match against Leipzig.

His second goal, an incredibly long range goal, was a lob from some 45 yards over goalkeeper Peter Gulacsi. It was labelled the Goal of the Month by the German broadcasters.

By the end of the season, Serge Gnabry had made 26 appearances (including two appearances in UEFA Champions League and one appearance in UEFA Europa League) and netted 10 goals.

In the season, he also made one appearance in Regionalliga Südwest as part of the 1899 Hoffenheim II reserve team.

In 2018, he became a Bayern Munich player and scored his first Bundesliga goal for the club while playing against Freiburg.

In March the following year, he netted Bayern Munich's 4000th Bundesliga goal while playing against Gladbach. Bayern Munich was the first team to reach the mark.

Serge Gnabry concluded the 2018-2019 Bundesliga season with appearances in a total of 30 league matches and 10 goals, the second best in Bayern Munich. He also made 5 appearances in domestic cups (FA Cup and DFB-Pokal) scoring 3 goals and 7 UEFA Champions League appearance.

The season also saw him winning his first Bundesliga title as Bayern topped the League table. Additionally, Bayern Munich also claimed the DFB-Pokal Cup.

In the 2019-2020 season, he netted a total of 23 goals in 46 appearances including 10 UEFA Champions League appearances in which he scored 9 goals. With a win in the finals against Paris Saint-Germain, he lifted his first Champions League title.

In 2020, Gnabry and Bayern Munich bagged the DFL-Supercup, UEFA Super Cup as well as the FIFA Club World Cup.

Meanwhile, playing for Germany’s national team, Gnabry became the fastest player to reach 10 goals for the nation. He scored his 10th goal, in his 11th appearance, while playing a friendly match against Argentina that finally ended in a 2-2 draw.

Serge Gnabry was named Bayern Munich Player of the Season in 2018-2019.

He was also awarded the honour of Bundesliga Player of the Month for October 2019.

In 2017, he joined the Common Goal charity initiative and pledged to donate 1% of his earnings to a fund managed by NGO streetfootballworld.

In order to witness first-hand how football is changing lives, he visited his father’s homeland Ivory Coast in 2019 and visited TackleAfrica—an organisation he supports through Common Goal—to know more about their education-through-football programme.