Road to Dortmund | BVB Fan Blog

I find it rather symbolic that the first ever entry in this project is written today, after watching the Bundesliga game against Bochum.

It’s Saturday, February 15th 2025 and Dortmund is currently sitting at a rather shameful 11th spot in the league. This is the team’s second game this week, after a 3-0 win against Sporting Lisbon on Tuesday. It was a game of two halves, a Jekyll and Hyde performance in front of a tough crowd in Lisbon against a team that is going through its own set of challenges at the moment. But BVB achieved a strong result and were looking to pick up the much needed momentum in the game against Bochum.

Bochum is currently drowning in the relegation zone and the game is also a local derby, with only about a 25 minute drive from Dortmund. Because of this my expectation is that the team would be fired up for this game. 

There is also an interesting angle of BVB’s incoming Bundesliga schedule. Over next four games they play in Bochum, followed by home game against Union Berlin, away vs St. Pauli and back home vs Augsburg. These are all teams behind them in the standings, with only Augsburg enjoying a good form recently. Four must win games if the team is serious about climbing up to the 4th spot to secure Champions League slot for next season. Then their schedule gets more complicated facing Leipzig, Mainz, Freiburg and Bayern. All tough games.

What I find super interesting, and actually increasing my frustration as a BVB fan, is that the teams we’re chasing for that elusive 4th spot in the standings, are doing us huge favors by not performing to their standards and abilities. Both Stuttgart and Leipzig are struggling. Wolfsburg, Freiburg, Mainz and Bremen are playing each other in the next few games so some of them are certain to lose points. Critical time of the season, but somehow also perfect setting to switch gears and start climbing up the standings.

And this is where reality check hits like a truck. Dortmund fails to replicate their performance from Lisbon and loses to Bochum 0-2. Same inconsistency that bothered this club for a few years now, just escalated to brandt new levels during the 2024/25 season. Same problem this team struggled with under Sahin. 

The Good: Focus on the Positive

But it’s not all black an white and not everything about BVB’s season so far has been a negative. There are good things. Our defensive players (not to be mistaken for team defense) have been pretty good rather often. Schlotterbeck has been a leader in defense. Anton, while inconsistent, has had a number of really solid games. Emre Can has been a disaster in holding midfielder role but pretty solid as central defender (and on improving trend as well). Ryerson and Bensebaini, while each having their own set of flaws, have shown their quality more often than not. Nmecha elevated his game into becoming a key player for the team in the #6 role. Guirassy, while criticised – and fairly so – for his antics in some of the games has also scored 19 goals in 28 games and is currently leading scorer in the Champions League. He has also been the only consistent offensive player for the team. Gittens and Adeyemi are in a strange spot, where they have both been good, actually super good, quite often, but at the same time are also a big part of the problem. 

Overall as a team though, the good just hasn’t been good enough for Borussia Dortmund. The one part of BVB’s game that I have been most critical of in my own analysis of the team’s performances is the midfield. As a painful reminder, including Bochum now, we have already lost 5 Bundesliga games this calendar year. I’m writing this on 15th of February by the way. In this set of losses, the team’s ball possession in Bundesliga has been a staggering 70%. Yes, on average. Yes, including games against Leverkusen and Stuttgart. And Frankfurt too. It has been the same story over again – losing the ball and allowing the opponent to cut through our defense like a knife through butter, by simple and fast 2-3 passes. On the defensive side of the game our midfield has way too often been completely MIA, while not being able to do much while dominating ball possession. If you want to fix BVB’s play, fix the midfield. 

The Bad: Choice and Utilization of Players

Yan Couto was brought in initially on a loan and BVB has exercised the option to make the transfer permanent as early as October. For the price of €30M. 

Couto has started only 4 games this season so far and his contributions are usually limited to cameo appearances towards the very end of the game. He played in 14 games so far as of writing this.

This is one of the most creative and industrious players on the team and a typical offense-first wing back – strong in supporting offence, not great but able to hold his own defensively. He has played great at Girona last year (1 goal and 10 assist in 34 La Liga games) and has had glimpses of linking quick plays and provide dangerous crosses and runs on the right wing – and overall creative play, that the team has been missing big time this season – during the bits and pieces of game time he received. But these contributions has been few and far between because he’s not been getting playing time under neither Sahin nor Kovac – granted, injuries have played into this somewhat. 

But if a club like BVB pays a transfer fee in this range for a player, that player must play. It’s as simple as that. For €30M we need a player that will be used and allowed to contribute on a regular basis. 

Another great example is Maxi Beier, a €28.5M addition from Hoffenheim last summer, who also needs to get more of a chance to prove himself across consistent run of games. While the coaches play Gittens and Adeyemi, with almost blind loyalty in spite of both failing to recapture their strong, yet inconsistent, contributions from earlier in the season, Beier has only been a starter when covering for injuries.

The Ugly: Roster Makeup and Accountability

Is this becoming a club that is a transfer station on the way to top 10 clubs? In a way, yes. And that doesn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing. Smart scouting leading to getting players before they break out and then developing them and selling for major profit is a solid business model that could lead to strong sporting success when implemented the right way. The one prerequisite for it to work, is that you have to keep the core of players that will secure stability and will spearhead the culture and winning mentality of the club. But if your core and the players you likely end up selling/losing to bigger teams in 2-3 years is the same group of players – then you have a serious problem. And I believe this is where BVB is at the moment. With the likes of Hummels and Reus gone, the core is gone. The respected individuals, proudly bearing the flag in the dressing room and holding everyone in the team to a high standard, are gone without appropriate replacements. In business, succession planning is actually one of critical management skills, to ensure smooth transition and futureproof continuity. This is where squad planning has failed in Dortmund and I’m afraid management has underestimated the impact the departure of both Hummels and Reus will have on the ability of the squad to operate as a team. A winning team.

There is of course the board and management that drive and advocate the winning mentality across the club, but let’s discuss that at a different point in time as I believe that might warrant its own article. What is clear is the player core needs to be re-built and it needs to consist of players that will be here for many years and will always play for Bundesliga wins.

As a fan, I have seen enough this season to hope for more proactive integration of players who have not been first choice so far. Champions League performance has had its ups and downs but overall has been a positive component on the season’s resume, so stick with whatever works. But in Bundesliga this team needs changes and it needs them now. In the three games so far under the new coach, it looks like Kovac trusts the established starters to find answers and I’m not sure that’s the correct course of action. I believe the roles of Brandt, Sabitzer, Gittens and Adeyemi are ones that need most urgent corrections – either through these players figuring out how to deliver strong performance twice a week, or introducing rotations that will allow for more flexibility and eventually, higher performance standard.

If Brandt cannot connect a forward pass on a consistent basis or hit the goal to save his life, play Reyna. This is a player that has had difficult time to get a starting role for years now, including on loan at Nottingham last year, so I think there is something there about Reyna we don’t see from the outside. Because the pure talent and ability is certainly there to be an impact player in the #10 role. But if Brandt, who is relied to be the creative mastermind behind BVBs offence, cannot create anything against a team like Bochum, is there really a downside in starting Reyna? 

If Sabitzer cannot drive play – try Ozcan instead in a more defense-first role, or Svensson depending how comfortable he is in the CM role. But from what I’ve seen from Svensson so far (arguably small sample size), being able to transition from LB to CM during games without missing his assignments, it does seem like a real option to me. Overall, on paper Sabitzer is the better player than both, as he’s demonstrated over his career. But we need results right now and if he can play reasonably well in Champions League but becomes consistently invisible in Bundesliga, he needs to be benched during these games. Ozcan and Svensson are much better suited for defensive coverage anyway, which is where this team has been failing in spectacular fashion on a consistent basis. I’ve deliberately left out Chukwuemeka as option because he’s yet to stay fit since joining earlier in February. Though I have to say I liked the few minutes he’s played against Sporting. Although in the second half of that game everyone played well. I’m also cutting Gross some slack here since this is his first season in the club and I don’t see him as a key player in the same way Brandt or Sabitzer are supposed to be for the team.

If Adeyemi or Gittens cannot figure out when to pass and when to shoot or how to get the ball to their striker open in front of goal, if most of the team’s offensive efforts die on one of them losing the ball – start Beier and Duranville. Both are fast, high effort players, Beier especially is a pressing machine. He has not been in great form but has also arguably been used way too sparsely to get into anything resembling solid rhythm.

Identity and Leadership

Addressing the gaps in leadership and overall identity that Hummels and Reus provided to the club is nothing BVB can course correct in the short term. It is a very typical ‘you don’t know what you have until you it’s gone’ situation, except in a big club like Borussia Dortmund this should have been foreseen and addressed accordingly. I would expect that management knew these players so well, that their leadership and impact on the team is so well documented, there would be a very specific plan and set of actions focused explicitly on replacing their voice in the room and on the field, once they inevitably depart. Clearly, this did not happen. 

The most glaring issue with the team is also one most difficult to fix. No surprises, that’s how it typically is, right? I mentioned previously that the team core needs to be rebuilt. The club needs more players with strong character, loyalty, and hard working attitude. I believe we might have few pieces of that already on the team in Schlotterbeck and Beier, who could represent this going forward. 

But more recruitment and squad building with scouting for character as top priority is needed – ideally on the back of commitment to a head coach who will represent a strong long-term project that players will be able to buy into. Watching this team play, way too often I’m finding myself wishing we had that heart and soul box-to-box midfielder that didn’t give an inch of space away and our opponents really really hate to play against. Think of who’s that player at Bundesliga level and go sign him, now.

I believe this season can still be turned into some positives. I believe three games in, players now gave Kovac a proper taste of what this team is in its current setup. Now I will look forward to the Sporting game mid-week where I will hope for strong performance and advancement in the tournament. Then over the weekend we will have another go at trying to salvage the Bundesliga season and I will hope (again) for something fresh and different in the approach to the game and starting eleven setup. This time BVB players have to bring their A game, because the time is running out.