Mark George
8th November 2020
Dortmund went down at the Signal Iduna in yesterday's classic fixture against Bayern, losing 2-3 and conceding more goals in the night than they had in the rest of their Bundesliga campaign this season. Despite having taken the early lead with a decisive strike from captain Marco Reus, the home team's efforts proved inadequate in their attempt to break the current champions' winning streak. With a nearly immediate equaliser from Bayern's David Alaba, the game moved into its second half with nothing to separate the two teams, before Robert Lewandowski clenched the lead against his former team just four minutes into the second half. A goalless thirty minutes or so followed, with both teams trying to break through the opposition backlines but few chances actually materialising from their pursuits and none amounting to a goal.
Leroy Sane broke the silence in the 80th minute, converting a Lewandowski assist to produce a third goal for Munich and widening the gap for Dortmund to bridge in the dying moments of the thriller fixture. Erling Haaland was able to net a goal in a bid for a late comeback just three minutes later, but Munich was able to solidify their backlines and prevent Dortmund from closing the gap. The game ended ten minutes later, Dortmund's second loss of the season and a less-than-stellar showing from Dortmund's front end of play against Munich's weakened defence.
Haaland acknowledged his lack of finesse in front of goal despite scoring in the game's final moments, having missed 3 shots earlier. "I have to score more goals," the 20-year old Norwegian striker said. "If we don't put our chances away at this level, then we won't win." A more notable absence was Jadon Sancho's fierce output in the final third, in a continuing trend of poor showings against top-tier teams, as pointed out by pundit Philip Kuehl. "This is clearly not a showing you would expect from a player valued at 120 million euros," remarked Kuehl. "Something certainly has to change."
Lewandowski greets Haaland on the pitch following the final whistle, Dortmund, GER (Source- APB/GETTY)
Following last night's game, Leverkusen and Monchengladbach stand poised to tie-die Schwarzgelben's table score of 15 in the Bundesliga. Both teams have a game in hand and a chance to rip the league-wide open as the Bundesliga closes down for players on international duty. Dortmund will play their next match against 12th placed Hertha Berlin on November 22nd, a Saturday fixture, and a chance to propel themselves back into contesting the top two in the league, who at the moment appear to be RB Leipzig and Bayern Munich.
Bayern themselves have cemented their position as top of the league with a small but safe two-point lead with their win against Dortmund. However, this early in the season, any and all monopolies are vulnerable to disappearing- Dortmund and Leipzig are most definitely now clawing at the heels of the Bavarians, who for now celebrate their victory and their newly claimed top spot in the league for the first time this season.
(Source- ESPN, GOAL, APB, Getty Images)
Edited by- Arjun Rohit Vikraman