Borussia Dortmund rarely shines in terms of play at the moment, but the results prove coach Edin Terzić right. The sixth victory on the eighth Bundesliga matchday is an expression of BVB’s new mantra: “Less sexy, more success.” Captain Emre Can uses the game against Bremen to make a recommendation.
The league lead may not last longer than late Saturday afternoon, and with a bit of luck even into Saturday evening. Nevertheless, after the start of the 8th Bundesliga matchday, it can be said that Borussia Dortmund is in a much better position than the manageable euphoria surrounding the club would suggest. In the summer, last year’s last-minute runner-up drew conclusions from the tragically missed title, as coach Edin Terzić reported after the 1-0 (0-0) win against Werder Bremen and then summed it up succinctly in four words: “Less sexy, more success.”
The home game against Bremen serves as a clear example of this, because the 90 minutes on Friday evening were by no means a football festival. A brilliant pass from captain Emre Can put Julian Brandt in a great finishing position in the 67th minute, with a fine lob the 27-year-old scored the only goal in his 300th Bundesliga game. Only Eike Immel and Karl-Heinz Körbel were younger when they reached this mark; both ultimately made over 500 Bundesliga appearances, with Körbel even holding the record with 602.
Terzić also wanted to talk about best results after his team remained undefeated for the 16th time in a row across all seasons. “You can speak of a constant development,” said the 40-year-old, who seems to have used the championship at the end of May, which was only missed due to the worse goal difference against FC Bayern, as an incentive: “We got 66 points from 27 games – there “We have to see in Europe whether another team has managed to do that.” That’s an average of 2.44 points per game, an outstanding rate. This season, after six wins and two draws, there are already 20 points, i.e. 2.5 per 90 Bundesliga minutes.
According to Terzić, it is no coincidence that the playful finesse and offensive spectacle of recent years has now given way to results-based football. “We have shown beautiful and sexy football for long enough over the last ten years, but in the end it did not lead to achieving our maximum goals.” This is reflected in the goal difference of 17:8; the win against Werder was already the third 1-0 win of the current season. There were five of them in the entire preseason.
According to Terzić, Can shows “the only thing that counts”
“We’ve made some really good steps in the last few weeks,” Terzić had already said before kick-off: “Not just in terms of results, but also in terms of performance. Now it’s about continuing the whole thing and proving that things continue to work to work hard, to keep earning.” Terzić, who took over BVB for the first time for six months at the end of 2020 and then again from his successor Marco Rose in the summer of 2022, seems to consider the sometimes staid performances to be necessary.
Against Bremen, however, it was also due to the poor exploitation of opportunities that Dortmund did not secure the decision earlier and instead had to tremble until injury time. Previously, as football commentators like to put it, Emre Can of all people had opened the goal of the day with an excellent pass. Terzić made him captain before the season, but he also put him on the bench twice after inconsistent performances. This is also why Can had to watch the first two international matches under the new national coach Julian Nagelsmann on television; in addition to goalscorer Brandt, only Niclas Füllkrug, Mats Hummels and Niklas Süle traveled from Dortmund to the USA.
This time, however, “he played a really good game,” Terzić rightly praised: “Emre won important running duels for us with his speed, won a lot of duels for us and also made good decisions when in possession of the ball.” The 29-year-old was very present in the center, showed great commitment, in short: a strong performance. According to Terzić, “the only thing that counts if you can recommend yourself for the next international break.”
The next chance for this is on Wednesday in the Champions League against Newcastle United, which has been boosted with Saudi Arabian millions (9 p.m./DAZN and in the live ticker at ntv.de), which recently defeated the Qatari-financed star ensemble from Paris St. Germain with 4: 1 had beaten up. In the European Cup, however, BVB has so far only been “less sexy”, and “more success” is still a long way off after the 0-2 draw in Paris and the 0-0 draw against AC Milan. It is the first meeting ever with the traditional club from the northern English industrial city, which is competing in the premier class for the first time since 2002 after being taken over by the Saudi Arabian sovereign wealth fund PIF.
2023-10-22 09:34:42
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