BORUSSIA DORTMUND WARMED up for their looming top-of-the-table clash against Bayern Munich with a 2-0 win at Wolfsburg today in the second weekend of the Bundesliga’s restart from the coronavirus-enforced suspension.
Goals by Raphael Guerreiro and Achraf Hakimi sealed an away win in front of empty stands to leave them a point behind league leaders Bayern.
On Tuesday, Dortmund host defending champions Bayern — who host Eintracht Frankfurt later on Saturday — in a showdown behind closed doors.
This was the second weekend of the Bundesliga’s restart, following a two-month hiatus, as the first top European league to resume during the coronavirus pandemic.
A minute’s silence was held before kick-off in the afternoon’s four matches to remember the victims of COVID-19, which has so far claimed 8,216 lives in Germany.
In Wolfsburg, Portugal winger Guerreiro, who netted twice in last week’s 4-0 derby thrashing of Schalke, scored his third goal in two games to open the scoring in the 32nd minute.
Erling Braut Haaland, who had scored 10 goals in nine league games since joining in January from Red Bull Salzburg, mistimed his attempt to meet the cross, but Guerreiro was on hand to tap home.
With the players calls echoing around the near-empty stadium, Dortmund had a let off early in the second-half when Wolfsburg winger Renato Steffen clipped the crossbar.
England winger Jadon Sancho helped sealed the win when he dribbled at the Wolfsburg defence, then laid a pass off to Hakimi, who fired home 12 minutes from time.
In the final minutes, Wolfsburg had replacement Felix Klaus sent off for fouling Hakimi.
Meanwhile Borussia Dortmund sports director Michael Zorc confirmed today that Mario Goetze, who scored the winning goal in the 2014 World Cup final, will leave at the end of the season.
“We will stop working together with Mario Goetze in the summer,” Zorc told Sky before the game away to Wolfsburg.
“It is a joint decision after a constructive conversation. Mario is a really good guy.”
The decision caps a frustrating season for the 27-year-old attacker, who has made only five league starts this term.
Goetze wrote himself into German football folklore by volleying home a cross during extra time in the 2014 World Cup final to seal a 1-0 win over Argentina at Rio de Janeiro’s Maracana stadium.
Six years on, Goetze has struggled to replicate the displays that once prompted former German FA technical director Matthias Sammer to describe him as “one of the best talents we’ve ever had”.
Having come through the academy, Goetze helped Dortmund win the league and cup double in 2011 and 2012 before he left for Bayern Munich in 2013.
However, he failed to hold down a first-team place in Munich and returned to Dortmund in 2016. The following year he was then sidelined for several months by a debilitating metabolic disorder.
Goetze made his 200th appearance for Dortmund on the opening day of this season, but he has featured sparingly since the arrival of Erling Braut Haaland in January.
On Friday, Dortmund coach Lucien Favre admitted it would be “difficult” for Goetze to win a place, while Germany legend Lothar Matthaeus last month urged him to quit the Bundesliga to reboot his career.
“Today, his way of playing football is no longer in demand,” Matthaeus wrote in a column for Sky.
“Above all, he lacks the speed to keep up with the football that Dortmund and many other top clubs play.
“It’s quite possible that Italy would be a suitable league for him,” added Matthaeus.
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