0‑4 against SC Freiburg, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
Player ratings25 Nov 2030
Peter Schulz could not have asked for more on his first appearance — 7.46
Debuts are survived rather than enjoyed. This one was enjoyed: 7.46, 1 goals, and a manager already being asked whether he starts again next week.
The terraces25 Nov 2030
The ground has had enough
“We travel everywhere and we get this.” 14 of the 50 senior players heard it walking off, and the ones who did not hear it were not playing.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Silas Huber: 1 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.11 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Serhou Guirassy was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nico Schlotterbeck is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Borussia Dortmund will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Borussia Dortmund this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jobe Bellingham is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
10 arrivals, an average age nobody would call a squad, and a set of parents being shown around a building their sons will spend more time in than at home. The scouting has already happened; today is only the paperwork.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Borussia Dortmund this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Feb 2030
Gregor Kobel falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 16 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Borussia Dortmund know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The words a physio says slowly. 42 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
3‑1 against Mlada Boleslav, and a performance that will be described to people who were not there for the rest of the season. Fábio Silva was at the centre of the description.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.21 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
6.97, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Serhou Guirassy was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nico Schlotterbeck is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.